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January 10, 1998
NEWS
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Heart-break in the tie-break for Anand"An anti-climax" is how former world title challenger Jan Timman described it, as Vishwanathan Anand lost to defending titlist Anatoly Karpov in the tie-break round of the world chess championship at Lausanne, Switzerland. What was surprising was that Anand, having done all the hard work by twice coming from behind to share points in the best of six games title clash, lost in the form of the game at which he is most adept -- rapid chess. Going into the tiebreak, time-limit round, Anand was believed to have the edge, but Karpov defeated him in straight games to keep his hold on the title. Interestingly it is Anand, not Karpov, who is ranked number two in the world behind Garri Kasparov. Anand in fact held the upper hand in the first game, but blundered. Anand interestingly opened with his king knight, and Karpov was in some time pressure straightaway as he tried to finesse the opening into the classic Reti style. Anand avoided a bishop exchange on move 18, and Karpov's bad positioning of the kingside bishop was believed to give the Indian a further edge. By move 30, Karpov had less than five minutes available on his clock. Winning a queenside pawn on move 34, Anand moved into a seemingly impregnable position and, by move 37, commentators were marking time before the inevitable. In fact, the feeling at the time was that Anand would win with black, then defend with the white pieces in game two to hold Karpov, thus winning the tie-breaker 1-0. However, the Indian went for a rather startling move on 40, which weakened his position considerably. Even at this point, Anand could have settled down to play for a draw but having blundered, he tried to retrieve the mistake with some rash play. Karpov was in considerable time trouble, but managed to wipe out Anand's kingside pawns and by exchanging a bishop for Anand's passed queenside pawn, the defending champion took complete charge. Anand, attempting unsuccessfully to draw the game with perpetual check, was forced to resign on move 62 when even that last ditch attempt failed. For the third time in the title round, thus, Anand found himself in a must-win situation at the start of the second tie-break game.The Indian opened with queen pawn for the second time in the match, and went on to play an uncharacteristically weak series of opening moves. By move 14, Karpov was already two pawns ahead, and from that point on, there was no chance for the challenger to come back into the game. A weak knight sacrifice on move 23 only made matters worse, and Anand resigned on move 32. "What can I say, I am happy I played a good game of chess," was all the Indian had to say at the end of the game. The moves follow:
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