[chessmind] Dennis Monokroussos: Anand replies to Kramnik's latest comments

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Posted by Dennis Monokroussos:
Anand replies to Kramnik's latest comments
http://chessmind.powerblogs.com/posts/1216598777.shtml


   Kramnik has been in the habit of devaluing the Mexico City tournament
   as a world championship event, more or less declaring that the only
   way to conduct a "real" world championship is in a match. At the very
   least, this is an ungracious thing for Kramnik to say, but at least he
   was saying it before the tournament actually started. At worst, it's
   rather condescending to Anand. Kramnik seems to be saying something
   like this: "Anand isn't really the champ yet, even though (friendly
   pet on the head), Anand did a nice job in Mexico and since everyone is
   calling it a world championship, well, shucks, I guess I'll call it
   one too. (Aren't I nice?)"
   You can (re-)read Kramnik's comments [1]here, and you can read Anand's
   slightly testy but mostly restrained comments in [2]this interview.
   The interviewer tries really, really hard to get Anand to lash out
   (something I've noticed more than once when the Indian press
   interviews him), but he mostly declines the bait - to his credit.
   Is there something poisonous about becoming the world chess champion?
   Topalov turned into a trash-talking jerk with respect to Kramnik after
   the former won the (FIDE) title in 2005, and now Kramnik seems to be
   following suit (though of course he's not the champion anymore). Since
   no one not in his cell phone's speed dial is likely to care about
   Kramnik's rationalizations (in fact, I've gone from rooting for
   Kramnik to rooting for Anand this fall), one might wonder why he's
   doing it.
   Here's a hypothesis. As Kramnik rightly noted, Anand did terribly
   against Kasparov. Why? In part because Kasparov was the better player,
   no doubt, but he wasn't that much better. One possibility is that he
   was simply intimidated by Kasparov - not only (or not so much) by his
   chess but by his manner, by his intensity. Likewise, he has struggled
   with Kamsky over the years, even when he seemed the significantly
   stronger player over the board. Kamsky, or rather his father, tended
   to generate an edgy atmosphere wherever Gata played. Anand seems to
   play at his best when everything is calm and normal, and when he's
   confident he's able to build on his successes. When things are a bit
   tense off the board and he's not playing his best, he plays well below
   his best. My suspicion then is that this is more strategy on Kramnik's
   part than anything else. He wants to generate as much agitation and
   aggravation in Anand as he can, in the hopes of throwing the champion
   off his game.
   Will it work? I hope it backfires, but based on Anand's track record
   it's probably a good strategy. Is it admirable? I say no, at least not
   if he's doing it deliberately.

References

   1. http://www.kramnik.com/eng/interviews/getinterview.aspx?id=178
   2. http://www.dnaindia.com/report.asp?newsid=1178637