Wijk Ann Zee, The Netherlands, Jan 11: World rapid champion Viswanathan Anand started his campaign with an easy draw with grandmaster peter Leko of Hungary in the first round of Corus chess tournament that got underway here yesterday. In what could be easily termed as a sensational upset, GM Vladimir Akopian of Armenia defeated top seeded GM Vladimir Kramnik of Russia to emerge as the leader in this 14-players category 19 event.
Most of the players took a peaceful route in the New Year, as a result of which draws dominated the first round. In fact the only decisive game of the day was won by Akopian who also earned the best game prize of the day with his Houdini act.
Anand's game did not have much apart from the theoretical interest in the Sicilian defence where Leko did not get anything as white. Choosing for the ultra sharp English attack, Leko was surprised at Anand's ready answers in a popular system and settled for the truce after 32 moves as Anand equalised comfortably. Bureau Report