Quiet Start At Mexico
By Arvind Aaron

Round one of the World Chess Championship Tournament started at Mexico City on September 13 at 2 p.m. (Indian Time, 00.30 a.m. on September 14) with all four games ending in draws. Draws at this level are good result for the black players and not so good for the white side. When the bigger names like Anand, Kramnik take the white side normally one will expect heavy scoring. However, that was not to be.

Anand, the NIIT Brand Ambassador played white and opened with his favourite king pawn. Gelfand responded with the Petroff's defence, which is currently the most solid for black and likely to be played in 50% of all games featuring 1.e4. Anand went for the Queen's Knight Attack variation by castling on the queen side and get an attack going on the king's side. But after his own new 12th move, white did not get much and with major pieces certain to go to the box with a series of exchanges on the e-file, Anand accepted Gelfand's draw offer on move 22. They are the two oldest players in the competition with Gelfand born in 1968 and Anand in 1969.

This world championship match is a 8-player double all-play-all happening at the Sheraton Historico Hotel. The other three games also did not last long. The longest game was 30 moves. Players preferred to be cautious on the opening day and risk from the white side was also minimal. Also, the opening choices of all games saw players sticking to main lines and watching what opponents were doing. On Sep 12 the event was flagged off after a colour opening ceremony. With 13 rounds left to be played, certainly more such all-drawn rounds are in store.

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The results (round one): V.Anand (Ind) drew B.Gelfand (Isr), V.Kramnik (Rus) drew P.Svidler (Rus), A.Morozevich (Rus) drew Levon Aronian (Arm), A.Grischuk (Rus) drew P.Leko (Hun). Pairings (round two): Aronian v Anand, Kramnik v Morozevich, Svidler v Leko, Gelfand v Grischuk.