Impressions on Game 12, Anand-Gelfand World Championship Match, Moscow.

This is it. Crunch time. With the scores tied, either one of the gladiators locked in this unrelenting struggle could bring forth a shining victory, a game that would win the match for them. Would this desire to succeed or the instinct for safety rule paramount?

As many commentators predicted, Anand opted for 1.e4. I think as it was the last game, Anand instinctively opted for systems, configurations in which he is innately comfortable with. That and the fact that the A-Team's labours had paid off, in the fruit of a powerful new opening idea.

As former champ Vladimir Kramnik pointed out, there were "so many nuances, so many move orders". White also had a plethora of tactical shots at his command. Gelfand sank into deep thought, clearly unsure of the position Anand was going down a prepared line, one that been worked out, its secrets unpeeled at home. He uncorked a flank pawn move aiming straight at the jugular, ie. Gelfand's castled king. In doing so, he gave up a pawn; Anand has always been an instinctive sacrificer of pawns in his quest for the initiative.

Soon, a "pawn portal", masses of black pawns appeared on the board while the white bishop limbered up to play a key role. After Anand's tenth move, repositioning his knight, the Challenger went into a prolonged cogitation. The position was novel and he had to start taking key decisions. One was to figure out which way white wanted to castle, and if possible put the kibosh on it. The other was, should he open up the position or opt for a defensive setup?

At least in clock times, it was a blast from the past, an echo of the dawn of Anand's career. At this stage the world champ had taken 5 minutes, while Gelfand had taken an hour to reach the 10th move.

If the clock handling was unpromising, so was the position. Grandmaster Shipov offered a gloomy prognosis: "Black has no obvious counterplay and it's not yet even clear what to defend against. In the long term time trouble is looming." Gelfand had dropped so far behind in the clock that the situation was approaching critical levels.

It was at this crucial juncture, with the eyes of the world upon him, Gelfand came up with the "move of the match". 10...c4, hurling a pawn into the jaws of death. A deep concept move.

With this the Israeli shed his doubled c-pawn and unshackled his bishops. Instead of passive defence he opted for direct measures. With this Gelfand solved his problems impeccably. Anand had sacrificed a pawn but Boris had trumped him by sacrificing two of them. Soon Anand's initiative was drained away.

At this point the contestants decided to call it a day. Was there still some play left? Experts disagreed but it was clear that the two had enough dosage of nervous tension. Such positions are like nuclear reactors, you can't spend too much time around them.They chose instead to transfer the final battle to the tie-breaks. A penalty shootout to decide a deadlocked struggle then.


Jaideep Unudurti


The 2012 World Chess Championship is being covered and reported on for this site by Jaideep Unudurti. Jaideep Unudurti is a journalist with interest in travel, photography and literature. He has written extensively on chess including a series of comprehensive interviews with Viswanathan Anand.

As 'Jai Undurti' he is the writer and co-creator of the "Hyderabad Graphic Novel", a pioneering look at the city's myths and history in comic-book form.

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