The Hindu : Sport / Chess : Topalov, Adams survive tough games

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Jun 29, 2004

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Sport - Chess

Topalov, Adams survive tough games

TRIPOLI, JUNE 28. Bulgaria's Veselin Topalov and Michael Adams of England, the top seeds at the World chess championship in Libya, overcame some tough resistance to win places in Monday's fifth round of the tournament.

Topalov, No. 1 in the tournament and No. 5 in the world, quashed the hopes of underdog Zdenko Kozul of Croatia to stay in the tournament in the second game of round four on Sunday. Second-seeded Adams, ranked eighth in the world, overcame some plucky play from the 16-year-old Hikaru Nakamura of the United States.

Topalov has only drawn one game so far, winning seven others with customary flair.

``It was a tough game, he put up a lot of resistance,'' Topalov told The Associated Press after Sunday's game.

Playing white, Topalov opened one of the day's most exciting long games with his favourite pawn to e4. He responded to Kozul's Sicilian defence with the razor-sharp Richter-Rauzer variation, moving his bishop to g5 followed by a queenside castling.

Kozul, always taking more time than his opponent, was undeterred and launched a pawn-led attack on Topalov's king. But the Bulgarian repelled that attack, took the main action of the game towards the other end of the board, and calmly proceeded to push his pawn up on the `a' file to eventually promote it to a queen.

Kozul exchanged the new queen for a rook, but with Topalov a rook up in the end game and threatening to turn another pawn into a queen, he wisely resigned.

Nakamura, effectively ranked No. 80 in the tournament after three last minute drop-outs above him, drew with Adams after responding to white's e4 with what some analysts said was the somewhat risky Alekhine defence. But Nakamura defended his opening, saying he had hoped to create chances with it by putting white in an unbalanced position.

Nakamura, who lost his first fourth-round game on Saturday, needed to win against Adams on Sunday for a chance to advance to tie-breaking games.

Players tied after their long games had to settle their differences in rapid and blitz games that continued until the early hours of Monday.

In the morning's last cliff-hanger, Russia's Andrei Kharlov knocked out his stronger-rated opponent Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu of Romania in a sudden-death match that required Kharlov only to draw his match to get to round five.

Nisipeanu had both a time advantage and an extra pawn, but Kharlov's ability to get his knight on d5 in the 36th move allowed him to improve his position.

A pawn down, Nisipeanu failed to find a way to attack black and, running out of time, he lost his dominant position, forcing him to resign with 28 seconds of the game left after black's 52nd move.

Topalov and Adams are the only two players from FIDE's top 10 to play in the $1.5 million tournament. — AP

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