Rajabov third in World Blitz Chess

The Russian won the tiebreak game against compatriot Peter Svidler to pocket the coveted title.

After a gruelling 15 rounds, both Grischuk and Svidler tallied an identical 10.5 points and in the ensuing tiebreaker the former proved superior with his white pieces.

Scoring 10 points in all, world number two Indian Viswanathan Anand tied for the third spot along with Azerbaijan's Teymur Rajabov but finished fourth overall with his slightly inferior tiebreak.

The $ 92,500 event was played on a round-robin basis between 16 players with four minutes being allotted to both players and a 2-second increment after every move.

Before the last round, Anand, Rajabov, Svidler and Grischuk were in joint lead on 9.5 points but the final round saw Anand only managing a draw against Boris Gelfand of Israel while Rajabov achieved the same result against Etienne Bacrot of France.

On the other hand, Svidler and Grischuk displayed top form to outwit Emil Sutovsky of Israel and Norway's Magnus Carlsen respectively. As a result both Svidler and Grischuk tied for the top spot and to determine the winner an Armageddon or sudden-death game was played in which Grischuk drew the white colour and had to win the game as in case of a draw, Svidler would have won the championship.

However, the younger Russian kept his poise to win the last game after 63 moves.

Final Standings:

1-2: Alexander Grischuk, Peter Svidler (both Rus) 10.5 each; 3-4: Teymur Rajabov (Aze), V Anand (Ind) 10 each; 5-6: Judit Polgar (Hun), Boris Gelfand (Isr) 9.5 each; 7. Etienne Bacrot (Fra) 8; 8: Magnus Carlsen (Nor) 7.5; 9-11: Sergey Erenburg, Emil Sutovsky (both Isr), Merab Gagunashvili (Geo) 7 each; 12: Michael Roiz (Isr) 6.5; 13: Ilia Smirin (Isr) 6; 14: Dmitry Gurevich (Usa) 4; 15-16: D Zoler, G Livshit (both Isr) 3.5 each.

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