Saturday 25 October 2008

2008 WCC - Game 8

Anand is edging closer to winning the 2008 World Chess Championship, with a draw in Game 8. He now leads 5.5-2.5 over Kramnik, and an Anand victory in Game 9 on Sunday would finish the match for good.
Once again the game started with 1.d4 and Anand's 4. ... dxc resulted in Kramnik choosing the Vienna variation. This is a sharp line to play, although it can also result in a lot of minor pieces being exchanged. Interestingly enough Anand ended up with the a similar pawn structure he had in games 3 and 5 (black pawns on f7,fg and e6) and once again he chose to place his rook on the semi open g file. Nonetheless Kramnik had a small advantage in the position and Anand was forced to play exactly, to prevent Kramnik from dominating the centre with a push to f5. Kramnik could have forced a draw on move 30, but as this wasn't the result he was looking for, he chose not to repeat the position a third time. However he wasn't able to find any other way to improve his position and the game was drawn on move 39.



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