Who will win the 2013 Candidates?

[Roger de Coverly]

they are Olympiad teammates

There have been reported to be teams where the players got on much better with their opponents than one another.

[Brian Valentine]

There are other variables too which are peculiar to chess. It would be very difficult for instance make statistical adjustments for playing style, opening repertoire etc. I think that all players, at any level, have certain opponents who they perform better or worse against than you would expect from looking at their respective ratings.

Alex has been talking about "Moneyball" concepts in games. All sports, where there is enough money to make it worthwhile, are attempting to capture and classify situations to apply statistics to gain an edge. We have seen in the stripsearch thread that internet chess centres have a clssification method to identify computer cheats.

Chess should be ideal for such an approach. The whole game, including time situations (the equivalent of positions) can be captured much more simply than any ball game. One just needs the motivation to start looking..

In chess we have computers who give reliable (but not always perfect) guides to positions. The positions simply depend on what is situated on each of the 64 squares (with a few extras for castling and e.p. rights). The question is can the subsequent game continuation shed light on the strengths and weaknesses of the player.

At present we use rating systems to assess players on results alone.

[Mick Norris]

2 horse race now Kramnik has won - is he favourite now?

[Clive Blackburn]

2 horse race now Kramnik has won - is he favourite now?

And Carlsen now looks as though he might lose for the first time (move 72)

[MartinCarpenter]

And there you go. Erratic genuises dangerous opponents

Not that it makes such a huge difference with Kramnik having caught up and the tie breaks being as they are. The sum of opponents score stuff would I guess have been very close had he saved that game instead?

[Paul Dargan]

And that's why backing 87% favourites isn't all it's made out to be...

[Clive Blackburn]

Now that Carlsen has lost it is wide open again:-

1 Vladimir Kramnik 8
2 Magnus Carlsen 7.5
3 Levon Aronian 6.5
4 Peter Svidler 6

[Jonathan Rogers]

Ivanchuk winning rather than drawing mainly makes a psychological difference. Even if it were drawn, Carlsen would have had the worse tie break and would probably have needed to make an extra half in the next two rounds. And that is the situation now, too, because if he gets back on level terms he will have had more wins!

What really mattered today was Kramnik winning (as opposed to drawing) rather than Carlsen losing (as opposed to drawing). Has Aronian commented on what possessed him to play g6? (Not that such blackouts don't happen - in such events where they are fighting hard every game, they are inevitable - but it does seem a shame that two have happened both against Kramnik, the other one being Grischuk v Kramnik). I guess VK is not cursing his drawing bad luck now, and nor is he complaining any longer about Ivanchuk's approach to the tournament.

[Colin S Crouch]

Wow!

I had genuinely not expected all this. Or at least I had partially expected some of it, but it is all a big surprise.

In the last year or so, Kramnik seemed to have lost some of his ultra-solidity, but now it is back again

A loss by Carlsen is statistically a massive shock, except that if anyone has gone through some of his recent games in great detail, it is not too difficult to that Carlsen has chanced his arm rather too often.

Many commentators have noted that Carlsen is not very comfortable in his early rounds. At the recent London Classic, for example, he did not play well in the opening against McShane in the first round, but McShane mad a big mistake, and eventually lost.

I get the feeling that perhaps Carlsen gets too nervous later on. At Wijk aan Zee later on, for example, it was noted that Carlsen would beet Kasparov's best record at this event, if only Carlsen could finish with two wins and a draw. He had two draws and a win, though, and these two draws were less than impressive. He was in more danger of losing than of winning.

The question now is whether Carlsen can keep his nerve here, in the last two rounds. Quite clearly, Aronian has lost his own nerve earlier. It is likely that Kramnik will keep hos own nerve.

All credit to Kramnik, and his immense experience at the top. The secret of such tournaments is to avoid losing any games, and just pick up a few wins along the way. Kramnik has achieved that. Carlsen hasn't - he lost a game. In the end, that is the difference.

[Matt Mackenzie]

The amazing thing is, Kramnik could easily win his last two games as well! Or will it be him feeling the pressure now??

[John McKenna]

My prediction for R13 on Sunday is a win for Carlsen and three draws.
Btw, I did not mean to imply that the Russians are playing the whole tournament as a tight unit while all the other participants are playing as individuals because they have different nationalities. Ivanchuk, Aronian and Gelfand all belonged to some degree to the same Soviet chess system before its demise and must still have a certain shared chess ethos that Carlsen, and possibly Radjabov, do not. I simply do not believe it is possible for those who grew up under the Soviet system to slough it off completely. And, as for nationality not counting - have you forgotten the ecstatic Armenians led by Aronian and the grim-faced Russians at the end of the Istanbul Olympiad last year?

[Ray Sayers]

It is interesting that Kramnik couldn't put the ball in the net and has won 4 out of his last 5 games. He has been gifted some points by some bizarre blunders too (e.g. the Griscchuk game).

Still, Carlsen can only blame himself for yesterday; he had the draw in hand and assumed Chucky would self-destruct. Chucky has basically been gifting points to all and sundry, especially on time. Carlsen underestimated him.

Now Kramnik must be favourite. I imagine he will beat Chucky in Round 14. If he beats Gelfand tomorrow it is basically over imo. Even if not, Carlsen has to score 2/2. Tough to do.

[JustinHorton]

Ivanchuk, Aronian and Gelfand all belonged to some degree to the same Soviet chess system before its demise and must still have a certain shared chess ethos

Aronian was what, nine when the USSR was dissolved?

[Roger de Coverly]

Aronian was what, nine when the USSR was dissolved?

Kramnik might be a slightly better example, but his debut as a 16 year old FM was in 1992, when selected for the Russian team by Kasparov.

[Jonathan Bryant]

There's a reason why Gelfand and Ivanchuk are still playing in these elite events 20 years on. They got a full Soviet chess education that was immediately denied to everybody else (although others, of course, got a partial chess upbringing).


Going back to who's going to win. Well, it will be all over tomorrow if Kramnik wins and Carlsen fails to beat Radjabov with Black - which is hardly and impossibility.

On a personal level I'd be delighted if Kramnik qualifies for the match with Anand - anybody who plays the Berlin is alright be me. As an observer of the chess world, however, I'd have to agree that someone who is head and shoulders above his contemporaries on rating and yet who is not World Champion is rather problematic.