ARONIAN TOPS AMBER, ANAND JOINT SECOND

Press Trust of India
March 27 2009

Nice (France), Mar 27 (PTI) World champion Viswanathan Anand missed
chances galore in the blindfold game against Chinese Wang Yue and
had to be content with an overall joint second finish in the Amber
blindfold and rapid chess tournament here.

Anand, however, maintained his supremacy in the rapid section as he
tied with Levon Aronian of Armenia and Gata Kamsky of United.

The Indian ace finished with an impressive 7 points out of a possible
11 in rapid section while in the blindfold he finished joint fourth
on 6.5 points.

Aronian drew both his games against former world champion Veslein
Topalov of Bulgaria in the final round and emerged as the clear winner
in the 18th edition of the prestigious event.

The Armenian finished with 14 points out of a possible 22 games and
remained a half point ahead of Anand and Vladimir Kramnik of Russia
who both shared the overall second spot.

Magnus Carlsen of Norway found his nemesis in the blindfold in Teimour
Radjabov of Azerbaijan and finished clear fourth after recovering to
win the rapid game. The Norwegian ended with a tally of 13 points
and was two points clear of next contender Alexander Morozevich
of Russia.PTI