A victory over Viswanathan Anand in the 4th round of the Candidates Tournament 2016 helped Sergey Karjakin move into sole lead after Round 4. At the moment, Karjakin is on 3/4, half a point ahead of second-placed Aronian.
Karjakin’s victory over Anand was a strategic one. The position after the opening, although equal, held dangers for Anand as he was behind the ‘hanging pawns’ structure. On move 19, Anand offered a dubious exchange of bishops, followed by a bold pawn push on move 23. However, the pawn move backfired for Anand, allowing Karjakin to simplify into an advantageous Rook and Knight endgame. Karjakin was spot on with his technique and went on to win the game without any fuss. This turned out to be Karjakin’s first ever victory over Anand in the classical format.
With this defeat, Anand has been pushed down to the No.2 spot in India after 30 long years. Pentala Harikrishna, with a live rating of 2763.3, is a mere 0.3 points ahead of Anand in the live rankings.
All the rest of the games were drawn. While Nakamura and Giri played out an exciting but home-cooked draw, Caruana failed to win an overwhelming position against Topalov. The Svidler-Aronian draw, however, was a relatively subdued one.