Hello,

  16 ... Bxd3 preparing f5 was a novelty in game 2. Before this game, thought Smyslov had shown this sort of Slav position to be ok for black. There are lots of places annotating these games but this one looks quite good.

http://chessmind.powerblogs.com/files/wcc2006_topalov_kramnik_2.htm

Bye John S

Indeed.  Hopefully, Kramnik will heed his own advice and continue to press despite the match score, both to see some interesting games and also for his own sake: if he can go 3-0 Topalov will have a huge task, while if Topalov scores at all (even if just a bloodless draw) it will surely settle his nerves a bit and there is plenty of time left for him.

Is another Catalan in the cards?

Smyslov_Fan wrote on 09/26/06 at 04:20:52:


Well not really. Helped most in part by the even worse blunders by Topalov. Kramnik exploited them mercilessly. "one bad move negates 40 good ones" or something to that effect.

Let me just say that I voted for Kramnik to win. What is surprising is I did not expect him to win in such a fasion. After having a day to digest what has happened and reading some of the above replies I have come to a conclusion on Toppa. HE SHOULD NOT CHANGE ANYTHING! As pointed out above once he is able to stop the blundering he will be fine. So long as Toppa sticks to his guns and keeps his cool look for him to close the gap.

Topalov doesn't need to change anything. To do blunders and miss opportunities has nothing to do with style or opening choices.

In principle, Topalov's match strategy is both good and correct.  In practice, it is slightly off the mark and needs some fine tunings.  It is the double-edged nature of his strategy that has produced 2 losses.  Just a slight tweaking in his form and he will turn those frowns  ...upside down  !  I expect he is emotionally and mentally just fine--he knows how it goes sometimes when you live on the razor's edge.  Besides he has a whole army in Elista to support him and keep his confidence up!

I like Kramnik's strategy with black vs. d4.  I think he is trying to skip around Topalov's prowess in deep, thorough preparation by mixing it up, we'll see of course as the match unfolds.  I expect Kramnik came to Elista armed with ideas in the QGA (Rublevsky), Nimzo (Motylev), QID, QGD, Slav (maybe from previous work w/Bareev), and Semi-Slav.  In fact, if I were Toppy, I would start out the same: 1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6 3.Nc3 Nf6 and give 4.e3 a try angling for a Meran or Anti-Meran Qc2.  I wouldn't be suprised though if Kramnik chooses a totally different defence for game 4.

Will 1.e4 be played in this match at all? Kramnik won't play it being up 2-0, so its a question if Topalov has anything up his sleeve vs. the Petroff.  Should be interesting.  This match is NOT OVER YET.

TalJechin wrote on 09/25/06 at 08:55:14:



You got some points but I still disagree here. Of corse there happened mistakes in the endgame. But first of all after a very exhausting battle of high level. Secondly and more important if you would analyse the Kasparov Korpov or short Kasparov battles with today chessengines this games will also look very human.
I am not happy either that the money for this match comes from K.I. but the chess of this two games is far away from coffehouse chess.

The diffrence to other WC is  the games are more Tactical as others (maybe with the exception of Short Kasparov) but does this make it coffehouse chess? Of course not. I am convinced that only very few player are able to create such an attack as Topalov did. And only few would have survived this game aginst him. (in both games)

This two games is what the chess audiance has asked for a long time - This was fighting chess and not tactical draws!

It looks more and more like a Coffee House Championship! It could be 'cause they have less time to think, but it's probably mostly due to the live audience on the net having easy access to e.g. fritz and Nalimov's endgame tablebase. Anyway, the contestants of a WC-match have never looked so human before...