Wijk Aan Zee (The Netherlands): After a lucky win in the previous round, world champion Viswanathan Anand was back to splitting points as he played out a quick draw against Dutch Jan Smeets in the 11th round of the Corus Chess Tournament here.
Anand took his tally to six points out of a possible 11 and apart from the draws, the Indian was lucky to post a victory against Alexei Shirov of Spain in the 10th round of the elite group 'A'.
With just two rounds to come in this category-19 event, Anand's chances of a comeback are bleak unless he comes up with a winning performance against Russian Vladimir Kramnik in the penultimate round.
Kramnik, meanwhile, was joined in the lead by world number one Magnus Carlsen of Norway who put it across Leinier Dominguez of Cuba. Both Kramnik and Carlsen now have 7.5 points and they are now a half point ahead of nearest rival Alexei Shirov of Spain.
Anand shares the fourth spot along with Vassily Ivanchuk of Ukraine, defending champion Sergei Karjakin of Russia and Hikaru Nakamura of United States while Dominguez and Hungarian Peter Leko share the eighth spot with 5.5 points each.
Anand did almost nothing with black pieces as Smeets was quite happy to get a half point against the World champion even though the latter had white pieces. The players split the point after just 15 moves.
Carlsen worked harder to beat Dominguez while Kramnik had some chances before he drew with Shirov.
In the 'B' group Parimarjan Negi got a slightly better endgame that petered out in to a draw with Emil Sutovsky of Israel Playing white, Negi faced the Caro Kann defense and had an extra pawn in the rook and pawns endgame that ensued.
However, a tenacious approach by Sutovsky saved the day.
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P Harikrishna played out a draw with Chinese Ni Hua in 59 moves of a Slav defense game where the former played white.
Anish Giri scored a lucky victory from a lost position against Wesley So and it seems that there is no stopping the 15-year old in this section. Giri moved to eight points out of a possible eleven and has a full point lead over Ni Hua and compatriot Erwin l'Ami.
Li Chao of China continued his domination in the 'C' group at the expense of Mariya Muzychuk of Ukraine. Grandmaster Abhijeet Gupta scored an impressive victory over Nils Grandelius of Sweden to move to 6.5 points.
Chao, on 8.5 points, enjoys a 1.5 points lead over a pack of three while Abhijeet stands sole fifth with two rounds to go. The other Indian in the fray Soumya Swaminathan went down to local hopeful Benjamin Bok.
Results round 11:
Group 'A': Loek van Wely (Ned, 4.5) beat Sergey Tiviakov (Ned, 4); Nigel Short (Eng, 4) drew with Fabiano Caruana (Ita, 4.5); Hikaru Nakamura (Usa, 6) drew with Peter Leko (Hun, 5.5); Magnus Carlsen (Nor, 7.5) beat Leinier Dominguez (Cub, 5.5); Vassily Ivanchuk (Ukr, 6) drew with Sergey Karjakin (Rus, 6); Alexei Shirov (Esp, 7) drew with Vladimir Kramnik (Rus, 7.5)
Group B: Anna Muzychuk (Slo, 5) drew with Erwin l'Ami (Ned, 7); Arkadij Naiditsch (Ger, 6.5) drew with David Howell (Eng, 5.5); Wesley So (Phi, 6.5) lost to Anish Giri (Ned, 8); Varuzhan Akobian (Usa, 3) drew with Tomi Nyback (Fin, 3.5); Parimarjan Negi (Ind, 6) drew with Emil Sutovsky (Isr, 5); Pentala Harikrishna (Ind, 5.5) drew with Ni Hua (Chn, 7) Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu (Rom, 4.5) drew with Dimitri Reinderman (Ned, 4).
Group C: Benjamin Bok (Ned, 5.5) beat Soumya Swaminathan (Ind, 3); Daniele Vocaturo (Ita, 7) beat Peng Zhaoqin (Ned, 5); Sjoerd Plukkel (Ned, 1.5) lost to Stefan Kuipers (Ned, 5.5); Li Chao (Chn, 8.5) beat Mariya Muzychuk (Ukr, 4); Robin van Kampen (Ned, 7) beat Robin Swinkels (Ned, 6); Kjetil Lie (Nor, 5) lost to Ray Robson (Usa, 7); Nils Grandelius (Swe, 5.5) lost to Abhijeet Gupta (Ind, 6.5).
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