75th Tata Steel Round 2013 R7: Anand, Carlsen Lead

Chess blog for latest chess news and chess trivia (c) Alexandra Kosteniuk, 2012

Hi everyone,

In round 7 of the 75th Tata Steel Chess Tournament World Champion Viswanathan Anand caught up with leader Magnus Carlsen by defeating Loek van Wely. Although the Dutchman achieved an adequate position on the black side of a Scandinavian Defence, his attempt to break free was ill-timed costing him first a pawn and then the game! Carlsen was nowhere near a win with Black against Peter Leko, but despite trying for 83 moves, neither was the Hungarian Grandmaster. Click on links to watch games with Chess King.

Group A: Round 7 - Saturday January 19
Vishy Anand - Loek van Wely 1-0
Ivan Sokolov - Pentala Harikrishna ½-½
Peter Leko - Magnus Carlsen ½-½
Sergey Karjakin - Levon Aronian ½-½
Hou Yifan - Fabiano Caruana ½-½
Erwin L'Ami - Anish Giri ½-½
Wang Hao - Hikaru Nakamura 0-1

After winning his second game, Hikaru Nakamura is only half a point behind the leaders. The 2010 Tata winner had a difficult pairing on paper, facing his nemesis Wang Hao with Black. Wang Hao was on plus 4 after just 7 games with Nakamura. However, the past was soon forgotten when the Chinese Grandmaster made a few errors in the opening, allowing the American Grandmaster to seize the initiative. Nakamura won an exchange and had no difficulties with the technical phase. 

The number three in the world, Levon Aronian was poised to win his third game in a row, this time at the cost of Sergey Karjakin. The Russian Grandmaster was completely outplayed in an Anti-Marshall of the Ruy Lopez, but just before the first time control Aronian missed a golden opportunity. In the game Karjakin's king escaped and Aronian even had to sacrifice an exchange to avoid trouble, with a draw as a result. 

The remaining three games, Hou Yifan-Caruana, l'Ami-Giri and Sokolov-Harikrishna, quickly transposed into equal endgames, resulting in three logical draws.

The leader in Group B, Richard Rapport, had no problem fighting off runner up Daniil Dubov's attempt to join the lead and the game was agreed a draw once an equal endgame arose. Sergey Movsesian of Armenia and Germany's Arkadij Naiditsch closed the gap with Rapport by beating the youngsters Robin van Kampen and Alexander Ipatov respectively. 

Van Kampen's loss was especially striking; trading his dark-squared bishop in a King's Indian he created a weakness that eventually became his downfall. 

In Group C Fernando Peralta of Argentina again took the sole lead, defeating Hjorvar Steinn Gretarsson with the black pieces. The International Master from Iceland seemed oblivious to the dangers of his position, andPeralta did not miss the win. 

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