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World Chess Championship 2007

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Vladimir Kramnik, the current World Chess Champion

The FIDE World Chess Championship 2007 will be held in Mexico City, beginning on September 12 2007, as an eight-player, double round robin tournament.

The Candidates tournament, to fill four of the eight places in the tournament, is taking place from May 26 to June 14, 2007, in Elista, Kalmykia, Russia.

Qualification

Originally, the top four players from the 2005 World Championship were exempted through to this tournament. However, Veselin Topalov (FIDE World Chess Champion 2005) was replaced by Vladimir Kramnik (Classical World Chess Champion) after Topalov lost his unification 2006 World Championship match to him.

Current qualifiers:

  1. Vladimir Kramnik - the reigning World Champion
  2. Viswanathan Anand - joint second place in the 2005 World Championship, current #1 ranked player in the world
  3. Peter Svidler - joint second place in the 2005 World Championship
  4. Alexander Morozevich - fourth place in the 2005 World Championship

A further four players will qualify from a sixteen player candidates tournament.

2005 World Cup

The 2005 World Cup, held in Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia, was one part of qualification for the Candidates Tournament. It was a knockout tournament of mini-matches, in the style of the FIDE World Chess Championships 1998-2004. However, once the last 16 was reached, players were not immediately eliminated, but played further mini-matches to establish places 1 through to 16.

The top finishers were:[1] [2]

  1. Levon Aronian
  2. Ruslan Ponomariov
  3. Etienne Bacrot
  4. Alexander Grischuk
  5. Evgeny Bareev
  6. Boris Gelfand
  7. Sergei Rublevsky
  8. Mikhail Gurevich
  9. Gata Kamsky
  10. Magnus Carlsen
  11. Vladimir Malakhov
  12. Francisco Vallejo Pons
  13. Alexey Dreev
  14. Loek Van Wely
  15. Joel Lautier
  16. Konstantin Sakaev

Candidates tournament

Template:Current sport section One place in the Candidates Tournament was reserved for 2004 FIDE World Champion Rustam Kasimdzhanov. Five places were then awarded to the top five players by FIDE rating (average of July 2004 and January 2005 ratings) who had not already qualified: these were Peter Leko, Michael Adams, Judit Polgár, Alexei Shirov and Etienne Bacrot.[3] The remaining ten places went to the highest finishers at the 2005 FIDE World Cup who had not otherwise qualified.

The Candidates tournament, being held in Elista, Kalmykia, Russia from May 26 to June 14, 2007, was originally to consist of a two-round knockout with one player qualifying from each quarter of the draw. In September 2006, FIDE proposed that these players play a 16 player, single round-robin tournament instead.[4] However this decision was reversed, and the tournament consists of two rounds of matches as originally planned.[5]

The 2005 World Cup winner Aronian is the top seed, with the remaining players seeded in rating order according to the January 2006 ratings list.[6] In the second round, the 1v16 winner plays the 8v9 winner, 2v15 winner versus 7v10 winner, etc.

Each match consists of six games, with four rapid tiebreak games to be played if necessary. If the score remains tied after the rapid games, then two blitz games will be played. If the score is still tied, the players draw lots for a single sudden death game where White has six minutes, Black has five, but White must win in order to advance.

Games can be viewed at the official site, and commentary can be found at sites such as Chessbase and TWIC.

The computer chess programs Deep Fritz and Deep Junior will play a six-game exhibition match alongside the main event.

Round 1

Seed Name 1 2 3 4 5 6 TB Total
1 Armenia Levon Aronian 1 ½ 0 1 0 2.5
16 Norway Magnus Carlsen 0 ½ 1 0 1 2.5
Seed Name 1 2 3 4 5 6 TB Total
8 Spain Alexei Shirov ½ ½ ½ 0 1.5
9 England Michael Adams ½ ½ ½ 1 2.5
Seed Name 1 2 3 4 5 6 TB Total
2 Hungary Péter Lékó ½ 1 1 1 3.5
15 Turkey Mikhail Gurevich ½ 0 0 0 0.5
Seed Name 1 2 3 4 5 6 TB Total
7 Hungary Judit Polgár ½ 0 ½ 0 1.0
10 Russia Evgeny Bareev ½ 1 ½ 1 3.0
Seed Name 1 2 3 4 5 6 TB Total
3 Ukraine Ruslan Ponomariov ½ ½ 0 ½ 1.5
14 Russia Sergei Rublevsky ½ ½ 1 ½ 2.5
Seed Name 1 2 3 4 5 6 TB Total
6 Russia Alexander Grischuk 1 ½ ½ 1 3.0
11 Russia Vladimir Malakhov 0 ½ ½ 0 1.0
Seed Name 1 2 3 4 5 6 TB Total
4 Israel Boris Gelfand ½ ½ ½ ½ 2.0
13 Uzbekistan Rustam Kasimdzhanov ½ ½ ½ ½ 2.0
Seed Name 1 2 3 4 5 6 TB Total
5 France Étienne Bacrot ½ 0 0 0 0.5
12 United States Gata Kamsky ½ 1 1 1 3.5

Uncertainties

After press conferences by the Kramnik and Topalov camps in mid-October 2006, significant uncertainties emerged. Silvio Danailov, the manager of Topalov, proposed a return match on 3 March 2007 in Sofia which did not take place. However, Kramnik supported Topalov being admitted to the 2007 Championship.[7]

Though there was press speculation that Kramnik may not play in Mexico City,[8] Kramnik has since confirmed his participation.[9]

References

  1. ^ 2005 FIDE World Cup Results at Mark Weeks' World Chess Championship Index
  2. ^ The Week in Chess 580
  3. ^ FIDE Rules for 2007 World Championship
  4. ^ FIDE proposes Candidates tournament 2007, Chessbase, 24 September 2006.
  5. ^ The Week in Chess 654, The Week in Chess, 21-May-2007
  6. ^ Rules & regulations for the Candidates Matches of the World Chess Championship 2007, FIDE
  7. ^ "Kramnik will not play Topalov in March", Chessbase, 17 October 2006.
  8. ^ "Kramnik’s crafty footwork", Malcolm Pein, Daily Telegraph, 18 October 2006.
  9. ^ Kramnik: A post Wijk aan Zee interview, his marriage, his lecture, Yuriy Vasiliev, 31 January 2007.

See also

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