Anand wins with black, takes lead

World Champion Viswanathan Anand crashed through the defences of Vladimir Kramnik of Russia in the third game of the world championship taking a 2-1 lead in the 12-game clash.

Whatever Viswanathan Anand did on the first rest day, he certainly did not lament after missing out on winning the second game. Making the most of some erratic chess by Vladimir Kramnik to win the third game of the World Chess Championship, Anand took a 2-1 lead in the 12-game clash.

The victory with black augurs well for the Indian GM as playing white, he can now pressure Kramnik.

The auditorium was nearly full on Friday well before the start of the third game. In chess, a paying audience of about 150 is considered good as a greater audience for the sport is on the internet and television.

They paid 35 euros for the ticket and there were over 350 people inside, making it the biggest audience thus far for this match. Anand did not disappoint the spectators as he demolished Kramnik with clinical precision.

The players blitzed through the first 12 moves and then Anand introduced a novelty, a well-prepared move that not only restricted development of Kramnik's pieces but also sent the challenger into deep thought. Kramnik needed nearly 45 minutes to make the next 4-5 moves while Anand, obviously well-prepared for this system of play, reeled off his moves.

Anand introduced the novelty in Slav Defence — a system in which the player playing with black gets to develop his queen well and wins a pawn without compromising his position. Anand used this system very well and also introduced a new move that gave him a slight advantage. Though Kramnik tried to fight back, he played wrong moves that weakened his defence.

Anand exploited the weaknesses, won two pieces and forced the Russian to resign on the 42nd move.