TWIC is 30. First issue 17th September 1994.
FIDE Candidates 2016 (3)
Aronian beats Topalov in Round 3 of the Candidates
Mark Crowther - Sunday 13th March 2016
The third round of the FIDE Candidates in Moscow again saw just one decisive game. Levon Aronian defeated Veselin Topalov with the black pieces to join Viswanathan Anand and Sergey Karjakin in the lead on 2/3 going into the first rest day on Monday.
Topalov and Aronian played an English Four Knights variation and starting on move 12 Topalov started to make some slightly inferior decisions. 12.Qxd3?! (12.ed or 12.cd were both better), 13.Qd4?! (13.Qc2) but it was only after 17.Rd1? (17.ed) that Topalov was in serious trouble. The position remained difficult with lots of options for black but Aronian retained a big advantage throughout and was winning at first time control which he quickly converted. Topalov is in danger of being cut adrift even at this early stage.
It looked like Peter Svidler would also be a winner with black after he outprepared Hikaru Nakamura. The position was very sharp and Nakamura would have been entitled to hope for attacking chances but they went away and he was a pawn down in an endgame. It's not clear to me whether black can convert the advantage but after he allowed the exchange of knights to go into a rook and pawn endgame white held easily enough.
Anish Giri gave perpetual check against Sergey Karjakin in an interesting game. Karjakin's 18...h5 followed by a pawn sacrifice was very sharp.
Round 3 Standings: 1st-3rd Karjakin, Anand, Aronian 2pts 4th-6th Giri, Caruana, Svidler 1.5pts 7th Nakamura 1pt 8th Topalov 0.5pts
Rest Day Monday
Round 4 Pairings Tuesday 15th March 2016 12pm GMT: Svidler-Aronian, Caruana-Topalov, Karjakin-Anand, Nakamura-Giri
| FIDE Candidates 2016 Moscow (RUS), 10-30 iii 2016 | cat. XXII (2778) | |||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | |||||||||||||||
| 1. | Karjakin, Sergey | g | RUS | 2760 | * | * | . | . | . | . | ½ | . | . | . | ½ | . | 1 | . | . | . | 2 | 2905 |
| 2. | Anand, Viswanathan | g | IND | 2762 | . | . | * | * | ½ | . | . | . | ½ | . | . | . | . | . | 1 | . | 2 | 2911 |
| 3. | Aronian, Levon | g | ARM | 2786 | . | . | ½ | . | * | * | ½ | . | . | . | . | . | . | . | 1 | . | 2 | 2903 |
| 4. | Giri, Anish | g | NED | 2793 | ½ | . | . | . | ½ | . | * | * | ½ | . | . | . | . | . | . | . | 1½ | 2780 |
| 5. | Caruana, Fabiano | g | USA | 2794 | . | . | ½ | . | . | . | ½ | . | * | * | . | . | ½ | . | . | . | 1½ | 2781 |
| 6. | Svidler, Peter | g | RUS | 2757 | ½ | . | . | . | . | . | . | . | . | . | * | * | ½ | . | ½ | . | 1½ | 2776 |
| 7. | Nakamura, Hikaru | g | USA | 2790 | 0 | . | . | . | . | . | . | . | ½ | . | ½ | . | * | * | . | . | 1 | 2645 |
| 8. | Topalov, Veselin | g | BUL | 2780 | . | . | 0 | . | 0 | . | . | . | . | . | ½ | . | . | . | * | * | ½ | 2495 |
| Round 3 (March 13, 2016) | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Anand, Viswanathan | - Caruana, Fabiano | ½-½ | 40 | C65 | Ruy Lopez Berlin | |
| Giri, Anish | - Karjakin, Sergey | ½-½ | 30 | E15 | Queens Indian | |
| Nakamura, Hikaru | - Svidler, Peter | ½-½ | 64 | D16 | Slav Lasker/Smyslov | |
| Topalov, Veselin | - Aronian, Levon | 0-1 | 50 | A29 | English Four Knights | |
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