Linares,
Poikovsky, Aeroflot Open ... the chess comunity has been spoilt recently!
All these
wonderful events were also taken into account for the ACP Tour. Strangely enough
their outcome did not really affect the head of the classification. As can be
seen in the standings, changes rather occurred in the battle for the critical
qualifying places.
1.
Anand 5 1598
2.
Leko 3 1170
3.
Gelfand 3 916
4.
Kramnik 3 813
5.
Bacrot 4 612
6.
Morozevich 2 610
7.
Amonatov 3 600
8.
Grischuk 3 567
9.
Bologan 2 545
10. Short
2 510
The top-4
remain the same as last month. Only Vishy Anand managed to gain some points to
increase his overall lead. Surpising number 5 is now Etienne Bacrot, whose
Russian tour proved very fruitful. His victory in Siberia earned him 480 points
and puts him 2 points ahead of Alexander Morozevich. Poikovsky's co- winner
Viorel Bologan also made a big step forward as he's now spurring on 8th ranked
Alexander Grischuk. As a matter of fact, Nigel Short and Sergey Karjakin are not
in the top-8 any more. Indeed, Farrukh Amonatov also made a surprising jump
forward thanks to his great result in the Moscow Open which was held just after
the Aeroflot Open. Speaking of the Aeroflot Open, which was extremely strong,
Alexander Motylev and Andrei Kharlov were the only ACP member to share 1st place
there and receive 279 points. Coincidentally, Linares has also been dominated by
two outstanding players who decided to stay away from the ACP, Veselin Topalov
and Garry Kasparov.
The coming
period will be much quieter as only three opens will be computed: the Acropolis
in Athens, the Foxwoods Open, and the Neckar Open in Deizisau.
Yannick Pelletier (ACP)