(Photo taken from the official site of the event)
GM Grischuk Alexander 2764 1/2 GM Carlsen Magnus 2872
GM Kramnik Vladimir 2810 1-0 GM Radjabov Teimour 2793
GM Svidler Peter 2747 1-0 GM Aronian Levon 2809
GM Ivanchuk Vassily 2757 1/2 GM Gelfand Boris 2740
Aronian made a novelty on move 11 and got a slightly unpleasant, due to not so good development, but fairly even position. Perhaps a better choice was 15…0-0 in order to see if white Q moves or not and only then to capture on d4 winning a tempo. White later got rid of the doubled pawns by taking on d6 and got an active position. Still had Black played 22…Nd5, he would be holding on just fine.
Gelfand and Ivanchuk played a Gruenfeld game, when 13.c4 and 14…Qd8 were interesting ways to continue the game :).
Grischuk launched an h-pawn attack on Carlsen’s Gruenfeld but looks like it evaporated after Bf5-g6 as the King’s position looked quite safe. Black opened the position up just in time and got a nice piece play with 16…Qa5.
Radjabov repeated the line he already faced against Aronian and Grischuk back in 2008 but this time Kramnik played 9.Ndb5. 15…Qd7 probably wasn’t a good novelty as Black got a relatively passive position and instead 15…Qd4 that happened twice looks more active. In any case, white’s two bishops were controlling the board very well. 20…Ne5 looked active but seemed that the pawn sacrifice wasn’t good after all. 28th of Black was a blunder but instead of it 28…Rc7 could have given a nice play for the pawn.
Carlsen is leading with 7.5 points, Kramnik moved up to 2nd place and has 7, Aronian has 6.5.
Today’s pairings
GM Carlsen Magnus 2872 – GM Ivanchuk Vassily 2757
GM Gelfand Boris 2740 – GM Svidler Peter 2747
GM Aronian Levon 2809 – GM Kramnik Vladimir 2810
GM Radjabov Teimour 2793 – GM Grischuk Alexander 2764