Anand is still in second spot

Sofia: Viswanathan Anand continued to find the going tough as he drew with world’s top-rated woman Judit Polgar of Hungary in the fourth round of the MTel Masters chess meet underway here on Monday.

Overnight leader Michael Adams of Britain signed peace with former world champion Ruslan Ponomariov of Ukraine to retain his slender half point lead over nearest rivals as for the second time in the event all the three games ended in a deadlock.

With Adams on 2.5 points out of a possible four, Anand, Polgar, Bulgarian Veselin Topalov and Russian Vladimir Kramnik remained half a point adrift of the Briton with two points each.

Ponomariov is at the bottom on 1.5 points with six rounds still remaining in this category-20 double round-robin tournament played under classical time control.

Not for the first time in this meet, it was another opportunity for Anand to have the upper hand. The Indian ace, who missed out on a promising position against Topalov in round one, had an optical advantage against the Primadonna that failed to yield fruit yet again.

Playing a Sicilian defence variation favoured by Czech Republic talent David Navara, Anand, black, threw caution to the winds with an early exchange sacrifice leading to wild complexities.

Polgar, to her credit, maintained her poise and played almost the forced manoeuvres to reach a piece down endgame wherein she had three pawns to compensate materially.

It was clear from that point in the endgame that only Anand was playing for a win but technical expertise of the Hungarian was a big hindrance for the speed king to reach the desired goals.

Down to the basics, the players eventually reached an elementary king and pawn endgame and signed peace after 70 moves.

Anand was not too sure about his prospects after the game. “For sure white was fighting for a draw and may be there was some chance,” he said in a mini post-match conference.

Polgar on the other hand realised that it was another tough day in office. “All my four games here have been hard fought, I am trying hard every time but then this is what is happening,” the leading lady of the world chess said.

Adams simply did not try hard enough once he was surprised early in the opening by Ponomariov.

Opting for one of the deeply analysed variations of the Caro Kann Defence, Ponomariov blitzed out the opening moves and a series of exchanges led to a balanced rook and pawns endgame wherein both players repeated moves to sign peace in just 27 moves.

For Kramnik, the day had just begun when suddenly Topalov unleashed an attack in the Petroff Defence game.

Playing black, the Russian was under pressure for some time but struck back quickly to defy Topalov any real chance. The Bulgarian in fact lost a pawn and could not find a suitable way to pocket it back.

The solace was eventually found in the enigmatic rook and pawns endgame in which a pawn’s deficit did not count as much as precise calculation, which Topalov did to reach a theoretical draw in 52 moves.