Round 5 in London: Tremendous Fight On All Boards But 4 Draws Only

http://candidates2013.worldchess.com/#todays-pairings-view

A tremendous fight, excellent defence and four draws - this is the way how one could characterise the fifth round of the London Candidate Tournament 2013.

Round 5 on 20/03/2013
SNo.	Name	ELO	Res.	Name	ELO	SNo.
3	Ivanchuk Vassily	2757	½-½	Carlsen Magnus	2872	8
4	Svidler Peter	2747	½-½	Gelfand Boris	2740	2
5	Kramnik Vladimir	2810	½-½	Evon Aronian	2809	1
6	Grischuk Alexander	2740	½-½	Radjabov Teimour	2757	7

Peter Svidler, playing with White against Boris Gelfand, went wild since the very beginning when he played move 11.h4. In several moves he achieved very promising position but then, as humorously Alexander Grischuk  mentioned during the press conference, he started playing strangely, sacrificing pawns and pieces from left to right...
The game was big surprise even for commentators in the press centre - GM Nigel Short and IM Lawrence Trent - who did not believe to their eyes when they saw the final position when the draw was agreed.




Vassily Ivanchuk overplayed Magnus Carlsen in the opening but Magnus defended himself tremendously well. First, he sacrificed a Pawn, then he simplified the position and later he went for Knights ending where his passed a-pawn was the factor which kept Ivanchuk in the bay. Eventually Carlsen sacrificed his Knight for two pawns leading to the final position King & Knight vs King.




Vladimir Kramnik also overplayed Levon Aronian and obtained massive advantage being two pawns up and having a pawn on 7th rank. However, in the opposite Bishop ending even such a massive advantage was not enough to win! However, Levon then defended himself precisely and draw was finally agreed.




Alexander Grischuk was also very close to victory, but then he underestimated the possibility of a piece sac on c5. Radjabov did not hesitate to take the advantage of such a resource. This lead to an interesting material imbalance where White obtained Knight for 3 connected passed pawns. With the time running short both player went for simplifications. Grischuk returned the material and final rook and pawns ending was drawish.



So it was very exciting round which confirmed that it is not a draw which matters but the quality of game itself. We can just looking forward to seeing round 6.