The most important activity on the World Chess Federation’s calendar, the World Chess Championship title match, began on Friday and runs until November 28. The match features the incumbent title holder, Norway’s Magnus Carlsen, 23, and challenger, Viswanathan Anand, 44, from India, and is being contested in Sochi, Russia. Carlsen won the championship title from Anand in November 2013, in his hometown, Chennai, without losing a single game in the best-of-12 series. Carlsen won three games and seven were drawn to achieve the 6.5 points which were required for victory.
Anand has been the world chess champion since 2007, and demonstrated his versatility in the ancient brain game. He is the only player to have won titles in three different formats, namely, match, tournament and knockout. Earlier this year, Anand won the Candidates tournament, thereby qualifying him for a return shot at the world championship title.
The championship has long been dominated by players from Russia and, before that, the Soviet Union. However, of late, chess players have been excelling from