Kozhikode, March 10: Winning Linares is to some top players the equivalent of winning the World title. For Viswanathan Anand, it certainly is close to a World championship victory as he had already stated in an interview that a tournament like Linares was possibly one of the methods to find the best player in the World because the strongest Grandmasters assembled there every year.Four years ago, Anatoly Karpov won the Linares event by a huge margin (in terms of performance rating, close to 3,000) and claimed that he was stronger than Garry Kasparov, a statement that revealed the respect the winner had for the tournament.
In sharp contrast, Anand, after he beat Michael Adams in the Fide Knockout World Championship, had also said he would not feel like a World champion unless he defeated Garry Kasparov because he was undoubtedly the strongest player in the World.
For Anand, Linares was one tournament where he had limited success in the last seven years. There was just the second place behind Kasparov acouple of years ago. Kasparov and Vassily Ivanchuk so much dominated the field in Linares in the last 10 years that others, except Karpov in 1994, got practically no chance to reach the top.
The significance of this Linares victory for Anand is that the Indian had not won a tournament ahead of Kasparov for many years. Linares-1998, is the best event Anand has won in his career. It was in January 1992 that Anand won the Reggio Emilia Category 18 tournament ahead of Kasparov.
Yet, the worrying aspect for Anand even in this victory is that he has not beaten Kasparov for well over two years in a normal game. His only loss in Linares 1998 was to Kasparov, which proves he is yet to come to grips with the Russian's play psychologically.
It was in Linares in 1991 that Anand first met Kasparov in a tournament. A creditable draw against the World champion then helped the Indian get more attention from the European organisers.
The same year, he beat Kapsarov in the Tilburg double round-robin and extended hislead over the World champion to 2.5-1.5 after the Reggio Emilia victory. Since then, Kasparov has not allowed Anand any chance except in the first half of their PCA title match in New York.
Anand's Linares success is a tribute to his consistency. He has scored well in the bottom group, beating Svidler, Shirov, Topalov and Ivanchuk and drawing with Vladimir Kramnik.
Linares-1998 may still not be statistically the strongest ever tournament because the Catgeory 21 Las Palmas event in December 1996 enjoyed a better Elo average, though it had only six participants.
For Anand, the year has gone well since his loss to Karpov. A shared first place in the Hoogovens tournament with Kramnik and now a clear first should see him in better light in the Melody Amber blindfold/rapid spectacle in Monte Carlo later this month.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
