World champion Viswanathan Anand continued to struggle with his form and settled for a tied third place finish in the Grenkeleasing world rapid chess championship here. After being eliminated in the prelims of the annual event that he had won 11 times earlier, Anand did not quite motivate himself to play well for the third place and all the four games against German Arkadiz Naiditsch ended in draws leaving the third place to be shared by both of them. Meanwhile, Armenian Levon Aronian won his maiden title on Mainz soil with a clinical performance against Ian Nepomniatchchi of Russia in the finals.

The former world junior champion from Armenia scored victories in the first two games itself and then sealed the event and the winner's jacket in his favour with a draw in the third game of the four-games final. Nepomniachtchi also drew the fourth game, leaving the scoreline to read 3-1 in favour of Aronian.

Anand failed to overcome his poor form and his play in the match for the third place against Naiditsch was strangely uninspired and lacked punch. "Well, as there is not that much at stake in the match for third place, it is very difficult to motivate oneself," Anand said later at the press conference.

The first game showed how difficult both Anand and Naiditsch, who had also played in the Ordix Open where he finished second to Mamedyarov, found to motivate themselves. Anand had White and chose a quiet Italian game, which ended in a listless 26-move draw.

... contd.