St Louis (USA), Aug 26:
Former World Champion Viswanathan Anand played out yet another draw with Alexander Grischuk of Russia to remain in joint sixth spot as the Sinquefield Cup chess tournament draws to a close here.
For the records, the seventh draw in as many games did not help Anand’s cause much even though the Indian ace remains within striking distance of the leader American Fabiano Caruana, who held Norwegian World Champion Magnus Carlsen to a draw after being down and out for some part of the game.
For Anand, it was an Italian opening that Grischuk probably expected and equalised without much ado.
The huge labyrinth of theory in the Ruy Lopez leading to nothing these days has been drawing top players to the Italian opening and Anand has been experimenting with it quite often these days.
As it turned out, Grischuk did not have a hole in his preparation and Anand yet again dwelled towards a draw in the ensuing queens and pawns endgame.
The Indian is now under pressure to win at least one game of the remaining two to stay within chances of a podium finish.
Caruana is not someone known for his defensive abilities but on this day the Italian-turned-American gave it all he had to defend a clearly worse endgame against Carlsen.
This probably was an indication of things to come in the next World Championship match between these two in November at London.(PTI)
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