St Louis: Chess ace Viswanathan Anand played out a draw with Maxime Vachier-Lagrave of France to remain in joint lead after the end of the eighth and penultimate round of Sinquefield Cup chess tournament here Thursday.
Anand played his last white game in the tournament against Vachier-Lagrave and had a small advantage but the Frenchman was quite up to the task in defence and steered the game to a draw.
Besides Anand and Vachier-Lagrave, Levon Aronian of Armenia also ensured he remained in the joint lead on five points after he was held to a draw by Peter Svidler of Russia in a very complicated game.
Sergey Karjakin of Russia was the lone winner of the day after he added to the miseries of Wesley So of United States, while World Champion Magnus Carlsen survived some anxious moments before signing peace with another Russian Ian Nepomniachtchi.
The all-American duel between Fabiano Caruana and Hikaru Nakamura also ended in a truce that left half the field in with a chance to clinch the title in the final round.
With three leaders on five points, Carlsen and Karjakin, on 4.5 points apiece, are the other two players who can win the last round and be the winner of this fifth edition.
Anand chose the English opening for the second time in the tournament. Earlier in round five, the opening had served the Indian well against Fabiano Caruana when the American had lost after some mind boggling tactics.
Vachier-Lagrave was happy to get a slightly worse position and defend it rather than going for some active continuation. Anand was better but it was not an easy task to build on the advantage. The Frenchman equalized after a slightly erroneous 20th move by Anand and the peace was signed 10 moves later.
Press trust of India
