World Chess Championship 2013: Probing Carlsen deals a body blow to Anand

Officials watch as India’s Viswanathan Anand (L) and Norway’s Magnus Carlsen (R) compete in their championship match in Chennai on November 9, 2013. 

The Norwegian is chipping away like a woodpecker at the bark of a tree. The relentless poking, it seems, is carving a painfully narrow canal that is clearly passing through an increasingly tormented mind of the ageing champion. At the end of yet another game, characterised by Magnus Carlsen‘s unnerving search for the slightest opening, the world champion stumbled deep into the fifth hour to surrender a second straight game. Viswanathan Anand might be on his own shores, but this is a battle that is being fought firmly in Carlsen’s territory.

The five time champion has been forced to work overtime game after game after a deceptively quick outcome in the first two games. The strain of dealing with a constantly evolving games for a lengthy duration of time is slowly but surely wearing out the five time champions. The last two games have underlined the impact of Carlsen’s prolonged end game strategies, with Anand making unseemly errors to allow Carlsen full points from seemingly drawn positions.

Both games appeared to head towards a rook endgame that should have theoretically ended in draws. But the 45th move on Friday – Rook to a1 where it seemed the g-pawn was an obvious choice to force a dead draw baffled fans and fellow grandmasters alike. Even experts were scrambling to explain the reason behind Anand’s failure to spot such an obvious choice. Of course arm chair discussions are relatively comfortable compared to being in the thick of it all inside a glass cabin playing for the world championship.

But even then, for a player with the calibre of Anand (ELO 2775 ) to commit such an error, no matter what the situation might be is not expected. And Carlsen, sharp as a tack, has been lying in wait for exactly something of this nature to pounce and punish his opponent. Stung by the defeat in game 5, Anand was expected to put in a creditable performance to recover his mojo and work his way back into the match.

There was intent in his opening – but Carlsen greeted e4 by opting for the Berlin defence as the game took on a similar hue to the fourth game. Anand tried a novelty when he moved his Bishop to g5 (King-Knight file), but if he expected a classical response, he was in for disappointment. Grandmaster Pendyala Harikrishna reckons that Carlsen’s response with his own Bishop at this point set off a mood of discontent in the reigning champion.

Another important insight, in the opinion of Harikrishna (ELO 2704), was that Anand may have given away at some level his desire or willingness to play out a draw when he initiated a series of quick exchanges from the 21st move to bring forth a queen and rook ending. The 45th ranked player from Andhra Pradesh felt that this was probably an expression in frustrated agony from the strain of losing game 5 and the fact that Carlsen did not respond to Anand’s overture on the 10th move.

As we have witnessed these past few days, Carlsen was happy to exercise his indulgent love for the drawn out end game against Anand throughout this championship, using his exacting style to test the champion’s patience and break down his resolve. The sixth game was another expression of this approach and the game unravelled one thin strand at a time.

The championship has been a great exhibition so far about how Carlsen has successfully negated Anand’s strengths by driving the game into the areas of his competence. While Anand has been a great exponent of the classical game, on the strength of his preparation and experience, Carlsen has deviated from the regular variations to ensure that a lot of the game is played on the board and not off it.

Even in the sixth game, Anand missed a few opportunities to ensure a certain draw. Harikrishna pointed out last evening that Anand missed one such move on the 51st opting instead to play the Rook to b8. And the final nail was hammered in for Anand, when he missed playing the pawn to b4 on the 60th move. The world champion walked straight into Carlsen’s lair when the challenger threw the bait by teasing him with the King.

Ra4 drew instant shock from around the world, for once again, Anand had played a move that left people baffled about how a man of Anand’s pedigree could even make such a mistake. But then they weren’t dealing with the strain of having to defend for nearly five hours against a young man at the prime of his game.

With a two point deficit, Anand is clearly staring down the barrel. And his only hope now could be in adapting to Carlsen’s style and changing course to meet the exacting demands of this unraveling championship match. The key might be in the middle game, says Harikrishna, who believes Anand has to remain positive and play much more accurately in the next few games to shift the pressure back to Carlsen. If not, this match could be over sooner than we might have anticipated.