Anand crowned champ

Indian ace gets the better of Naiditsch in final round

World champion Viswanathan Anand notched up his first title of the year when he scored an emphatic victory over German Arkadij Naiditsch to lift the Grenke Chess Classic trophy here.

In what turned out to be a nail-biting finish, Anand had to wait for Fabiano Caruana to go wrong once again as the Italian misplayed a highly promising position and drew with Daniel Fridman of Germany to give the Indian ace a clear victory.

“After Bilbao 2011 my big problem was getting interesting positions where I had chances. This year the new problem has been exploiting those chances. I’ve been gifting people half points,” Anand said.

Anand finished with 6.5 points in all and ended half a point ahead of Caruana. Adams and Meier tied for the third spot with five points apiece while after another debacle, Naiditsch remained on four points for his fifth place finish while Fridman ended last on 3.5 points.

Anand opened with the Sicilian defence but Naiditsch deviated from the game on his 14th turn and Anand sacrificed an exchange early in the opening in return for two pawns. Naiditsch went haywire after the exchange of queens and could not handle the complexities that remained.  Naiditsch then made the fatal error and had no chances in the pawn race before the Germany resigned.

Results (final round): Arkadij Naiditsch (Ger, 4) lt to V Anand (Ind, 6.5); Michael Adams (Eng, 5) drew with Georg Meier (Ger, 5); Daniel Fridman (Ger, 3.5) drew with Fabiano Caruana (Ita, 6).

The moves: A Naiditsch vs V Anand: 1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 d6 3. Bb5+ Bd7 4. Bxd7+ Qxd7 5. c4 Nf6 6. Nc3 g6 7. d4 cxd4 8. Nxd4 Bg7 9. O-O Nc6 10. Nde2 Qe6 11. Nd5 Qxe4 12. Nc7+ Kd7 13. Nxa8 Qxc4 14. Nc3 Rxa8 15. Bg5 e6 16. Re1 Nd5 17. Nxd5 Qxd5 18. Qxd5 exd5 19. Rad1 h6 20. Bc1 d4 21. Rd3 Rc8 22. Rb3 b6 23. Kf1 Ne5 24. Ra3 a5 25. b4 Rc2 26. bxa5 bxa5 27. Rxa5 Nd3 28. Ra7+ Kc6 29. Rxf7 Nxe1 30. Kxe1 Rxc1+ 31. Kd2 Rg1 32. Rxg7 Rxg2 33. Ke1 Rxh2 34. Rxg6 Rh1+ 35. Kd2 h5 36. Rh6 h4 37. a4 h3 38. a5 h2 39. a6 Kc7 40. Rh7+ Kb8 41. Ke2 d3+ 42. Kd2 Ka8 43. Rh5 Ka7 44. Rh6 d5 45. Rh8 Kxa6 46. Rh6+ Kb5 47. Rh8 Kc4 48. Rc8+ Kd4 49. Rh8 Ke4 white resigned.