Anand beats Firouzja, jumps to joint sixth

Wijk Aan Zee (Netherlands), January 25

Viswanathan Anand gave a fine endgame lesson to teenaged Iranian Grandmaster Alireza Firouzja, jumping to joint sixth position at the end of the 11th round of the Tata Steel Masters chess tournament.

With his second victory, Anand clawed his way back to a 50 percent score and will now hope to end the tournament on a high. At just 16 years, Firouzja is less than one third Anand’s age, and the Indian ace showed that the Iranian still has a lot to learn. Anand started with the Nimzo Indian and faced the Samisch setup by the Iranian.

The middle game was double-edged but Anand made the most of it. Converting to a rook and opposite-coloured bishop’s endgame, Anand capitalised on his better pieces to tie down white’s forces and in the end forcibly won a pawn.

This was Firouzja’s third straight loss in the tournament after a brilliant start. “I was not very optimistic before the round,” Anand said after the game, adding: “I felt that after the rest day he will get back in some sort of control, but he is very dangerous and aggressive.”

Caruana zooms ahead

With two rounds to go, Fabiano Caruana of the United States made a decisive stride forward for his maiden title here, crushing Vladislav Kovalev of Belarus to reach eight points. The American now enjoys a one-point lead over world champion Magnus Carlsen. Wesley So of the United States is in the sole third spot on 6.5 points, a half-point clear of Jan-Krzysztof Duda of Poland. — PTI

Results (Round 11)

Nikita Vitiugov (Rus, 4) drew with Daniil Dubov (Rus, 5.5); Alireza Firouzja (FIDE, 5.5) lost to V Anand (Ind, 5.5); Vladislav Kovalev (Blr, 3) lost to Fabiano Caruana (USA, 8); Jan-Krzysztof Duda (Pol, 6) drew with Magnus Carlsen (Nor, 7); Vladislav Artemiev (Rus, 5.5) bt Jorden Van Foreest (Ned, 6); Wesley So (USA, 6.5) drew with Jeffery Xiong (USA, 5); Anish Giri (Ned, 5.5) drew with Yu Yangyi (Chn, 4)