[chessmind] Dennis Monokroussos: Bilbao, Day 1: Carlsen leads

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Posted by Dennis Monokroussos:
Bilbao, Day 1: Carlsen leads
http://chessmind.powerblogs.com/posts/1220423503.shtml


   Here are the results of round 1, [1]Bilbao-style:
   Anand - Ivanchuk 1-1
   Radjabov - Topalov 1-1
   Aronian - Carlsen 0-3
   Strangely, I can't seem to find any game scores that confirm those
   results: TWIC, Playchess.com, ICC and the rest all have 1/2-1/2,
   1/2-1/2, and 0-1 in their game files. I guess the Bilbaotians are
   playing some different game that looks a lot like chess, but isn't.
   For the sake of simplicity, let's pretend that it really is chess
   rather than a variant, but I'm not sure that that's an accurate
   appraisal.
   So: Anand-Ivanchuk was a slightly strange game, in that Anand's
   novelty in the Marshall Gambit gave him no advantage whatsoever, and
   that lack of advantage didn't seem to require anything special from
   Ivanchuk at all. Black's equality, which soon became an initiative,
   was immediately evident, and Anand had to play well to make sure he
   didn't get in trouble. In this aim, he was not entirely successful.
   Ivanchuk managed to win a pawn, but in severe time trouble Anand gave
   him a draw. (I say "gave" because, at least according to the times
   given on ICC, Ivanchuk had less than 30 seconds for the rest of the
   game, with no new time control or increments to bail him out. There
   were some problems with the relay of that game, however, so those
   times may not be accurate. On the other hand, if they're not, then
   Ivanchuk's decision to give Anand the draw becomes hard to
   understand.)
   The other draw, Radjabov-Topalov, was clean and balanced throughout,
   and although the players continued until only kings were left, the
   second half of the game was essentially unnecessary. Still, it's nice
   of the players to put on a show.
   Finally, that leaves us with Aronian-Carlsen, a game won by the
   Norwegian wunderkind, who is now back to #2 on the [2]Live Top List.
   (Anand is #1 at 2798.8, Carlsen is #2 with 2791.6. Stay tuned.)
   Aronian sacrificed a pawn for compensation in the form of the bishop
   pair and more space, but (probably wrongly) gave them up to slightly
   mess up Carlsen's kingside. After that happened, Aronian had one
   chance to maintain the balance, but after missing it he was simply
   down a pawn for nothing in a queen and rook vs. queen and rook ending.
   Carlsen was able to use threats to Aronian's king to reach a won queen
   ending with an extra, passed a-pawn, and as usual his technique was
   perfectly up to the job.
   Thus Carlsen leads the Grand Slam Final after one round, but with nine
   rounds to go and peculiar scoring, practically anything can happen.
   Meanwhile, [3]here are the round 1 games, with my comments.

References

   1. http://www.bilbaofinalmasters.com/en_index.asp
   2. http://chess.liverating.org/
   3. http://chessmind.powerblogs.com/files/bilbao2008_rd1.htm