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World Championships 2008

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ajachi

As everyone in the chess fraternity knows, a rather important match is going to be held at Bonn in October - November of this year. I can be hardly called an unbiased neutral, but since this is my first world championship match - There was no coverage of the 2006 match in India - I am understandably excited.  So splash your thoughts on anything and everything on the match - predictions, latest news, rumours, training regimens, telecast times, et c.

A little background to start with...

Head to Head

AnandDrawsKramnik
Anand (White) – Kramnik (Black)2190
Kramnik (White) – Anand (Black)2226
Total4416

This along with the fact that Anand is five years older than Kramnik seem to suggest that the latter holds the edge, but current form, talent and the championship advantage is with Anand. As recent results have shown there probably won't be a clear winner. Who is going to win???


Achterberg

I hope Anand, but I think Kramnik will prevail.

Unless P.H. Nielsen and Vishy will come up with very strong improvements in both the catalan and the petroff, i think Kramnik will hold with black and push with white.


ajachi
Kramnik's greatest strength is drawing at will. Anand's greatest weakness is losing drawable games. That could make all the difference.
Achterberg

 We don't have to wait long to see their next encounter :-)

I just saw the pairings for the Melody Amber tournament.

This afternoon we have Anand-Kramnik blind and Kramnik-Anand rapid. 

 


Charlie91
In another forum I said there that Anand will win.  I guess he's more likable than Kramnik.  Wink
Smartattack

the winner of this game will face the winner of Topalov vs Kamsky.Personally i believe Topalov will get back his title.


ajachi

Who, other than me, believes Topalov was shortchanged? Despite being the FIDE Champion, he was not given the Championship Advantage (Winning the title in case of a tie). Understandable, considering it was a reunification match. Then he wasn't invited to Mexico for the title match. Stupid.


TheOldReb
ajachi wrote:

Who, other than me, believes Topalov was shortchanged? Despite being the FIDE Champion, he was not given the Championship Advantage (Winning the title in case of a tie). Understandable, considering it was a reunification match. Then he wasn't invited to Mexico for the title match. Stupid.


Apparently , Kramnik and Topalov both agreed in he contract of their match that the loser would NOT take part in Mexico. I dont understand why they would do this but thats what I understand happened and is why Topalov didnt play Mexico. I also dont understand why they use rapid games to break the tie for a classical chess match? Why not play sudden death, where they play classicl games until the first win and the winner takes the match? In the playoff they can draw lots again to see who gets white in the first game.


dalmatinac
 Topalov and Kramnik are not in good relationships,I am fan of Anand but I would like to see game between Topalov and Kramnik,their games are always very exciting and "bloody"
CaptainZorg
Having only returned to the world of chess recently my knowledge of the two is limited at best but I would warrant that as long as the games are enjoyable and played in the right spirit 'chess will be the winner!!'
Smartattack
Topalov is not a very consistent player and often blunders.But i think it s recognised by many as the most spectacular player of nowadays, in good shape he can pull out amazing wins.
pogsiters

i think kramnik will prevail at this maTCH

ericmittens

Today is the day boys and girls!

Kramnik has white, can he draw first blood??

We await with baited breath!

TheOldReb

This match should be very interesting. Why is Leko in Kramnik's camp and does this mean Kramnik might play the marshall against Anand's spanish? Leko is a specialist in the marshall I believe. Or, will Kramnik stick to the petroff and/or the berlin efense? Surely Anand has prepared for these ? And how will Anand fight to draw as black against the catalan ? Did he get any help/ideas from Carlsen perhaps? The opening choices are gonna be interesting indeed.

ericmittens

I hear that the online trasmission will be delayed by half an hour to encourage people to pay 10 euro for the "premium transmission" with all the fancy cameras. Yell

TheOldReb

I believe Playchess will cover the games live, with no delay.....I will check later to see as I have a membership there.

grover-dill

There is some very good analysis of each game between Anand and Kramnik at

http://www.uep-worldchess.com/Ā  just click on grandmaster analysis on the left column

ajachi

If anyone cares, I'm back on Chess.com after 6 months. scut_fargus, I'm watching it on uep, but there's no grandmaster analysis. The exact address is http://87.230.38.130/apache2-default/toma/tfd_neu.htm. I got here from the UEP site by choosing game viewer 1. What am I doing wrong?

gardelin
ajachi wrote:

If anyone cares, I'm back on Chess.com after 6 months. scut_fargus, I'm watching it on uep, but there's no grandmaster analysis. The exact address is http://87.230.38.130/apache2-default/toma/tfd_neu.htm. I got here from the UEP site by choosing game viewer 1. What am I doing wrong?


It's just what it is - live relay of games - no analysis, so you are not doing anything wrong. There is GM analysis onĀ  http://www.uep-worldchess.com/ under "Analysis Grandmaster" option but not for games in progess, just finished games...

ajachi

Oh, thanks! I'm looking at the annotation on chessdom.com, it's spartan but good. And live. (My net speed is too slow for live video feeds)