Viswanathan Anand defeats Garry Kasparov in Croatia Grand Chess Tour

Zagreb: Five-time world champion Viswanathan Anand registered a win over Russian Grandmaster Garry Kasparov in the Croatia Grand Chess Tour tournament on Saturday.

Playing with white pieces, Anand defeated the 13th world champion in half an hour in the fourth round of the Blitz event.

The Indian Grandmaster, however, faced a defeat at the hands of Ian Nepomniachtchi. The Russian had a slow start, with losses to Mamedyarov and MVL in rounds 11 and 13. By finishing with 4.5/5, Nepomniachtchi managed to keep his sole first place after all.

“I basically lost two normal positions with two big blunders, against Shakh and Maxime. So first of all, I tried to stop blundering and pull myself together. In general, I don’t think I played too good, but it was enough to change the flow and score some wins,” chess.com quoted Nepomniachtchi as saying.

Earlier this week, Anand defeated Dutch Grandmaster Jorden van Foreest on his return to competitive chess.

Former world champion Anand, who was playing his first over-the-board game in almost 17 months, started off with a win in round one of the Croatia Grand Chess Tour tournament.

However, the Indian champion faced a defeat at the hands-off Frenchman Maxime Vachier-Lagrave in the second round before drawing with Ian Nepomniachtchi of Russia.

The Zagreb Rapid and Blitz are being staged from July 7 to 11 in Zagreb, Croatia. The time control in the rapid is 25 minutes for each player with a 10-second increment per move, starting from move one.

The time control in the blitz is five minutes for each player with a two-second increment per move, starting from move one. The rapid counts double for the final standings.

The tournament is the third leg of the Grand Chess Tour and has a USD 150,000 prize fund with the first prize of USD 37,500.