E-Paper
Anand strengthens position as World number 1
The Indian chess ace takes a 23-point lead against World Champion Vladimir Kramnik in the latest FIDE rankings.
Reigning supreme, Viswanathan Anand has strengthened his position at the top with a whopping 23-point lead against World Champion Vladimir Kramnik in the latest FIDE rankings issued by the International Chess Federation.
The Indian ace, who climbed the top of the ranking charts for the first time in April after upstaging Bulgarian Veseline Topalov, has added six points to be at ELO 2792 in the quarterly updated list.
Topalov's downslide, however, continued as he was placed third behind Kramnik (ELO 2769). Kramnik swapped places with the Bulgarian with the benefit of just one point.
Vassily Ivanchuk of Ukraine followed at fourth spot after climbing eight places to upstage Russia's Alexander Morozevich to fifth. Ivanchuk gained 33 ELO points to be 2762.
In other significant movements in the top-10 list, Levon Aronian of Armenia slipped three places to eighth, Azerbeijani Teimour Radjabov went down two places to ninth while Dmitry Jakovenko of Russia leaped to 10th spot from 18th. Spanish Alexei Shirov was 11th with the gain of 10 places.
Among other Indians, Krishnan Sasikiran (ELO 2674) fell 14 places to 39 while P Harikrishna gained 12 places to be 46th.
Grandmaster Koneru Humpy, ELO 2572, was at the top among in the women's rankings as Judit Polgar of Hungary (ELO 2707) plays in only men's tournaments.
Dronavalli Harika was the next best Indian at 15th spot while Vijayalakshmi Subbaraman was at 20th place.
