Vishy Anand won the Corsica Masters Knockout on Monday in Ajaccio, Corsica. The World Champion beat 2010 winner Shakhriyar Mamedyarov of Azerbaijan 2-0 in the final. In the semifinal Anand had a narrow escape against Krishnan Sasikiran, who had earlier won the 9-round Swiss.

Our first report about the Corsican Circuit focused on the issue with the Iranian grandmaster who refused to play against an opponent from Israel. It was not the last issue the organizers had to deal with. In the next round, Rauf Mamedov and Marc Arnold drew their game relatively quickly.

PGN string

However, this was against the tournament rules. In fact even before the MTel Masters existed, the now-called 'Sofia rule' was already in effect in Corsica, something the players were not aware of apparently. The game was declared lost for both.

And then, in one of the side events (a blitz tournament on Saturday) a Bulgarian player was disqualified and asked to leave for offering money to his opponent, as reported on the website of the French Chess Federation. Well... it's about time that we have a look at the chess that was played on the French island!

The big Swiss event was eventually won by Krishnan Sasikiran. The Indian grandmaster was the only player to finish at 7.5/9 while our blogger GM Gawain Jones finished in clear second place. Arguably the most interesting game was the following - quite original stuff from such strong players!

PGN string

Corsica Circuit | Swiss, round 9 standings

Video impressions

The top 14 players qualified for the traditional knockout rapid tournament, where they were joined by two invited players: World Champion (and multiple winner) Vishy Anand and 2010 winner Shakhriyar Mamedyarov. The system for this event was 2 games of 10 minutes plus 3 seconds increment, and if required, two blitz games at 3 minutes plus 2 seconds increment, and if required, an Armageddon game.

The quarter-finals took place on Friday, October 28th in the evening, just hours after the 9-round Swiss had finished. The top seed of the classical event Laurent Fressinet had apparently lost all his energy, and lost to Gabriel Battaglini (2452). The other results were less surprising:

Viswanathan Anand 1.5 – 0.5 Avetik Grigoryan
Krishnan Sasikiran 2.5 – 1.5 Rauf Mamedov
Ivan Cheparinov 3 – 1 Gabriel Battaglini
Shakhriyar Mamedyarov 1.5 – 0.5 Gawain Jones
 

Video impressions

The semifinals saw the following results:

Viswanathan Anand 3 – 1 Krishnan Sasikiran
Shakhriyar Mamedyarov 2 – 0 Ivan Cheparinov

However, it all could have gone differently, if Sasikiran hadn't missed a golden opportunity to beat his compatriot in the second rapid game (the first had ended in a draw):

PGN string

Anand went on to win both blitz games.

Video impressions

All this happened in Bastia and after a rest day on Sunday, the players moved to the Palace of Congress in Ajaccio. There, Anand faced Mamedyarov in Monday's final. In the first game the World Campion picked the 3.f3 line against his opponent's Grünfeld - in fact an old pet line of Mamedyarov himself! The Indian won convincingly:

PGN string

In the second game Mamedyarov made clear that these days in the QGD it's possible to play the g2-g4 push as early as move 7. He needed to win, and tried hard, but Anand defended well and also won this game.

PGN string

Video impressions