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Anand draws with Korchnoi

Vishwanathan Anand and Viktor Korchnoi (Switzerland) played out an exciting draw as the seventh round of the city of the Dos Hermanas chess tournament saw a full round of draws.

Michael Adams of England stays in the lead with five points from seven rounds, while Vladimir Kramnik (Russia) is close behind at 4.5 points.

Grandmaster Anand is still way behind at 2.5 points from seven rounds and he is still winless. He is sure to lose some ELO points from this tournament as his expected would be far higher.

Anand and Korchnoi were involved in a interesting battle which was a French Defence, with the old MacCutheon Variation. Anand with white was more conventional and pressed hard, but Korchnoi who had lost to Anand in the Tilburg tournament in 1998 defended well here and gave no advantage to the Indian. The draw came in 29 moves.

Against Topalov, England's Adams played in a Closed Sicilian, despite getting some advantage in the beginning, Topalov managed to hold Adams at bay. The game continued in a tough manner for 56 moves before the Bulgarian got a half point.

Kramnik and Polgar played long for 61 moves but the former was not very keen on going for aggressive play. Polgar defended well and got away with a draw despite being in fairly poor form which has seen her lose four games so far.

Karpov and Gelfand played in a Catalan and drew after 41 moves, while Miguel Illescas added one more feather in his cap with a draw against Peter Sidler, who is having a indifferent tournament. The game was a Sicilian and lasted 26 moves.

This evening is a day of rest, but Karpov will play his orginally scheduled ninth game with Adams on Thursday. The reason being Karpov is scheduled to go make an appearance at the Disney tournament in Paris, France.