Defence is the best form of defence

Impressions on Game 5‚ Anand–Topalov world championship match‚ Sofia

Vishy Anand's impersonation of an anvil continued, bravely bearing up the blows that Topalov rained on him. The fifth game, despite ending in a draw, saw some excellent chess worthy of a summit match. Play was rich and complex with a see-saw struggle that tested the spectator's nerves as much as the players themselves.

Topalov opened with his queen pawn. Anand once again responded with the Wiesbaden variation of the Slav defense which had brought him a draw in the third game. In that game while Topalov got some pressure going, he could not seriously ruffle Anand's plumage. So the commenting experts were intrigued to see Topalov continue this path. Obviously in the interval between the games, the Bulgarian's seconds and computers would have worked on the opening, to grind down the position and squeeze its secrets out. A dangerous game of bluff developed - did Topalov really have anything up his sleeve or was he trying to spook Vishy? After a think, Anand decided to avoid any ambushes that may lie in the thicket of variations ahead and played a new 15th move, moving up his king-rook pawn to block the incursions of its opposite number. With this move, the character of the position underwent a change. It was clear that Anand was looking for something more than the passive but solid defence of the earlier game.

Still the game was looking a bit dull, but excitement was provided by the Bulgarian power company CEZ, or rather one of its workers who accidentally shut off power to the whole of central Sofia. The hall was plunged into darkness and the arbiters stopped the clocks. The darkness while discomfiting the spectators, of course had no power over the players. Top grandmasters have incredible powers of visualization, they can "see" the game perfectly inside their heads. To most of us, such an exercise would be that of trying to remember which piece sits on which square - to them, they don't see the pieces at all, but the powers they inhabit, the auras they project. The board is filled with lines of force, concentric circles of move possibilities - each piece, each pawn is a bell, which when gently struck with the fingers of their mind emits a subtle vibration that only they can hear.

Power returned after about 20 minutes and play resumed. Immediately however, on move 22 Topalov made an inaccurate Bishop move. Apparently his team had worked on the position but he had mixed up the move order. Chess blogger Dennis Monokroussos joked, "Now we know why Anand is the world champion: Topalov can only make it to move 22 before he forgets his preparation, while Anand makes it to move 23 before he does!"

The inaccuracy was marginal but world championship matches demand the highest precision. Anand immediately saw a way of equalizing the position by offering a pawn. His pieces, which were awkward and shy like love-lorn teenagers, would immediately begin working together. Topalov declined to take the pawn but now the position was "stabilised" in Anand's words. This game is a good example of a unique feature of chess - you have to be good even just to appreciate it. Any monkey with a mouse can blather online about Tendulkar or Messi (and millions do) but to offer an opinion in chess you do have to be an expert. The later phase of this game contained many fine moments oscillating as it was between completely drawn to totally won - moments which will no doubt captivate a grandmaster but alas much of it went well over my head.

The next passage of play offers some interesting moments. So far Anand has had white in the first game of the mini-matches - that will reverse now. A byproduct of this means that he will two whites in a row. Anand can end the match right now if he lands a winning blow in either of these games. Topalov has to dig deep and defend - if he survives with the Black, then the match is still wide open.

Jaideep Unudurti is co-writing the Hyderabad Graphic Novel (http://hgnp.wordpress.com/)