The World Championship match between Norwegian World Champion and Indian challenger has reached halfway with Carlsen leading the score with 3.5 points against Anand’s 2.5 points
Vishwanathan Anand
The World Championship match between Norwegian World Champion Magnus Carlsen and Indian challenger Vishwanathan Anand has reached halfway with Carlsen leading the score with 3.5 points against Anand’s 2.5 points after 6 games. The first player to score 6.5 points will be declared the world champion in a match of 12 games.
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Vishwanathan Anand
For Anand, the situation is similar to that after the second game of the match which he had lost to the World Champion. Anand is yet again one game down in the match having lost the sixth game. All eyes will be focussed on Monday on Game 7 to see if Anand can repeat the miracle in Game 3 where he had immediately struck back to level the match. The advantage for Carlsen is that he is definitely more cautious now than in Game 3 where he was caught unaware by Anand’s depth of preparation for this Match.
The fact is that Carlsen will be playing with White in Game 7 will not help Anand to take revenge immediately as the world champion is nearly invincible with White pieces. It will require a tremendous effort on Anand’s side to overcome the disappointment of losing the last game which in fact he was winning after Carlsen’s blunder.
Such missed opportunities are hard to digest in such a short match and Anand’s Team and supporters will be watching the Game 7 in the hope that the Indian challenger will start afresh to fight back in the match.
The author, a former India women’s chess champion, is the youngest Padma Shri awardee at 16