Victory charge: Anand stamps authority with 2nd win

World champion Viswanathan Anand scored his second victory in the World Chess Championship, again with black pieces, against Vladimir Kramnik of Russia to extend his lead to two points.
If one thought Kramnik, playing with white pieces and trailing by a point would go on the offensive for the equaliser, they were quickly corrected. It was yet another Slav defense by the Indian ace in the fifth game and Kramnik went for what he had chosen in the third game, giving an idea that he had prepared something against the variation. However, Anand had other ideas and once again he was the one to come up with another surprise. If Kramnik thought he was going to deviate from the earlier game, he was proven wrong as Anand came up with a different idea on the 15th move.

Like in the third game, Kramnik yet again felt the heat and spent a lot of time on his clock. Anand got a good lead on the time while his position also remained intact. Kramnik went for unwarranted complications instead of trying to regain the momentum, which caused him dearly. The Russian was under pressure when Anand just improved the position of his pieces and maintained a fairly balanced position.

With the clock ticking away and not many options in sight, disaster struck the Russian on the 29th move. Going for a tactical move, Kramnik missed a fine retort that turned the tide decidedly in Anand’s favour. The Russian had started the combination with a piece sacrifice that boomeranged in quick time, and Anand ended the game with a clinical finish —sacrificing his last minor piece to ensure his central pawn’s march to glory. The game was over in 35 moves.