Viswanathan Anand will not be in the hunt for the World title for the first time since 2006. Instead, it will be Sergey Karjakin of Russia, the world's youngest GM ever (at age 12 in 2002), who will take on Norwegian Magnus Carlsen, the reigning champion and the world's third youngest GM (at age 13 in 2004), in the championship match in New York this November. Once Anand drew his 14th and last round with Peter Svidler in the Candidates tournament in Moscow on Monday, it was clear that Italian-turned American Fabiano Caruana needed to beat Karjakin to clinch the deal.
Caruana had stayed unbeaten in this tournament, but the burden of winning with black pieces to stay afloat was too much to handle. He was well and truly silenced by Karjakin's brilliant end game skills in 42 moves. Caruana went on the offensive after getting a good position but Karjakin was upto the task.
Anand, the only player to beat Karjakin in this event, said: “I threw away a nice event (chance). It's a bitter-sweet feeling. On one hand, I am satisfied for being in contention (till the penultimate round). But I also wasted the opportunity.” The 46-year-old five-time world champion was non-committal about his future vis-a-vis World title matches.
