Anand Vs Nakamura & The Battles of the Kings Indian
First of all I would like to wish Viswanathan Anand Happy Birthday and Hikaru Nakamura Belated Happy Birthday.
Hikaru Nakamura and Five-time World Chess Champion Viswanathan Anand share a few similarities:
- Birthday in the second week of December 9th Dec- Hikaru and 11th December - Anand
- Grandmasters
- Great Calculators
- Speed Giants - Numerous Blitz Tournament Victories. The cover photo shows Anand wining the title of Tata Steel Chess India blitz 2018 in playoffs against Hikaru Nakamura in 2018. The video below will show you the whole story of the last round.
- World Champions, Hikaru - Current World Fischer Random Chess Champion and the introduction of Anand says it all.
- Peak Rating of 2816(Hikaru) and 2817(Anand)
(You may add the one you find in the comment section).
Background:
I was looking at the game of Tigran V Petrosian Vs Efim Geller (1949). I was amazed by the play of Geller from the black side. Of course, many other players have carried the mantled form Geller, many masters form the past( Najdrof, David Bronstein, Stein etc.) including Garry Kasparov, Alexei Shirov, Teimour Radjabov, Judit Polgar and Hikaru Nakamura. Of course, the mantle from white side has been passed and taken by great players form Mikhail Botvinnik, Tigran V Petrosian, Viktor Korchnoi, Anatoly Karpov, Vladimir Kramnik, and many more. The point here being every player has contributed to complex nature of the KID (Kings Indian Defense) and made it one of the very popular chess openings.
Then I remembered this game, which was shown by IM Dinesh Kumar Sharma, during the training of Olympiad team of Nepal Back in 2018 which he was kind enough to let me be part of it. I was wondering what possibly new you can get/ find in the huge theoretical book and variation of the King's Indian defense. But Anand Created showed his skills and greatness in this game even if resulted in Hikaru's favour.
The first picture (on the left side) is of course one of the best games of Hikaru (probably the best game). The right side shows the improvisation from Anand. You can also try to sacrifice your queen 6 times and if you fail don't worry, even after making a whole video about it IM Levy Rozman(GothamChess) Failed it to do so. I am still trying to comprehend its beauty.
Hope you enjoyed this blog.
Please mention your views in the comment section.