Karpov-Leko, Day 4: Draw, Draw (Part 2)
And so the Karpov-Leko rapid match ends with a score of 4.5-3.5, Leko, thanks to a single Leko victory (after a lousy Karpov novelty) and seven draws. It's not a match that will go down in the annals of chess history, but there are at least three good things that resulted from this event:
1. Leko managed to win an event without a last/late round collapse. Hopefully this will give his confidence a boost and he'll be right back in the thick of things at the top of the pile.
2. It wasn't a bad result by Karpov either, and it looks like he did some genuine opening research for the match. Hopefully this marks the beginning of a small rebirth of his career - it would be nice to see him contend with 2700s again instead of playing exhibitions with IMs and down.
3. The match offered a clinic on how to defend slightly worse positions. That won't draw the fans in like a Shirov-Polgar match, but speaking practically studying games like these is quite useful. And today's games continue that clinic: both players had excellent winning chances in their White games, but dogged defense (and probably some inaccuracies from White) held the draw in each case.
The games are here, unannotated, thereby affording you the chance to work things out for yourself. I hope you'll take that opportunity!
1. Leko managed to win an event without a last/late round collapse. Hopefully this will give his confidence a boost and he'll be right back in the thick of things at the top of the pile.
2. It wasn't a bad result by Karpov either, and it looks like he did some genuine opening research for the match. Hopefully this marks the beginning of a small rebirth of his career - it would be nice to see him contend with 2700s again instead of playing exhibitions with IMs and down.
3. The match offered a clinic on how to defend slightly worse positions. That won't draw the fans in like a Shirov-Polgar match, but speaking practically studying games like these is quite useful. And today's games continue that clinic: both players had excellent winning chances in their White games, but dogged defense (and probably some inaccuracies from White) held the draw in each case.
The games are here, unannotated, thereby affording you the chance to work things out for yourself. I hope you'll take that opportunity!
Related Posts (on one page):
- Karpov-Leko, Day 4: Draw, Draw (Part 2)
- Karpov-Leko, Day 3: Draw, Draw
- Karpov-Leko, Day 2: New, but not Improved
- Karpov-Leko: A Good Start for the "Experience" Side
Posted by Dennis Monokroussos on
Sunday September 3, 2006 at 10:24pm