Five-time world champion Viswanathan Anand did not capitalise on his chances and misplayed a better endgame to settle for a draw with Arkadij Naiditsch of Germany in the second round of Grenke Chess Classic, in Baden-Baden.
The draw with white pieces might prove costly for Anand especially because the position was clear better. This was second straight draw for the Indian ace in as many games after splitting the point with world number two Fabiano Caruana of Italy in the opener.
Meanwhile World champion Magnus Carlsen of Norway showed no mercy and defeated Michael Adams of England in his legendary torturous way. The Norwegian shot in to sole lead on 1.5 points following the victory as the other two games in the eight-player round-robin tournament also ended in draws.
Levon Aronian could do little against lowest ranked David Baramidze of Germany and had to sign peace while Fabiano Caruana achieved the same result against Etienne Bacrot of France.
With six rounds still to come, Carlsen is now followed by Anand, Caruana, Aronian, Baramidze and Naiditsch on one point each while Adams finds himself at the bottom of the tables on just a half point from his two games.
"When we got to this ending I thought my position is just very promising, some difficult choices…. I assumed I must be winning with four rooks (on board) but somehow I couldn't nail it. Every move I can show here is promising but I missed my chance somewhere," Anand said.
Carlsen not only won the first decisive game of the tournament but also ended his five games drawn streak in the process. The World champion had drawn the last four games to win the Tata Steel tournament less than a fortnight back and had drawn the first game here too against Aronian.
Results Round 2: V Anand (Ind, 1) drew with Arkadij Naiditsch (Ger, 1): Magnus Carlsen (Nor, 1.5) beat Michael Adams (Eng, 0.5); David Baramidze (Ger, 1) drew with Levon Aronian (Arm, 1); Fabiano Caruana (Ita, 1) drew with Etienne Bacrot (Fra, 1).
