The youth era has officially arrived in chess

A new age is upon us in the chess world. The signs have been visible for a while, with the average age of participants in the Candidates tournament having fallen by almost 20 years over the past five or six decades. The 26-year old Sergey Karjakin’s triumph in the just-concluded Candidates tournament at Moscow is an affirmation of a truth that the 46-year old Viswanathan Anand was fighting – and fought – so valiantly against.

The Russian won a hard-fought tournament with a surprisingly easy final round victory on Monday, finishing the event with 8.5/14 points, a full point clear of Fabiano Caruana and Viswanathan Anand at 7.5. In the process, he brought the valiant fight of the Indian Grandmaster and his hopes for a much-anticipated World Chess Championship rematch with Norwegian wunderkind Magnus Carlsen to an end.

The number story

The Karjakin-Carlsen title encounter this November will be the youngest ever for a World Championship by a long shot, and that is material evidence of an undeniable undercurrent of chess at the highest levels.

The number of Grandmasters since the advent of computers to study the game has risen significantly, and prodigious talents are getting ever younger – the champion and challenger being two of the youngest Grandmasters of all time. Five out of eight players at Candidates tournament were in their twenties.

Former world champion Anatoly Karpov became the youngest GM ever in 1970 at the age of 19. In contrast, there are currently 25 active players who turned GMs before the age of 15, including Karjakin who reached the milestone even before this 13th birthday.

Anand – a champion from the era of Russian domination in chess – could serve as a yardstick for the leapfrog of age in chess. His performance in Moscow was an indicator. The Indian veteran was far from outplayed in the tournament; even his games against the eventual winner were both decisive, including Anand’s magnificent win with the white pieces against Karjakin.

Anand had more decisive results than any in the tournament and never looked completely outplayed, barring the game against Fabiano Caruana. However, it remained clear that the fight was getting harder for the Indian, and his brilliance lay in the fact that he was catching up with the odds with his will, preparation and sheer mastery of the game acquired over the years.

The road ahead

A win in Moscow would have seen Anand take down titanic odds to win, but he still made a strong showing at the Candidates tournament, announcing that he is far from done fighting this battle. It is characteristic of Anand to rebound with resilience, like he did by winning his last Candidates without dropping a game after losing the title to Carlsen in 2013. In his title defence against Boris Gelfand, the Indian responded to a loss after several draws by beating the Israeli in the shortest World Championship game of all time.

It is safe to say that Anand will be looking to give it another shot in the future. He has maintained that he is still able to play his top chess at the major tournaments, and despite some scepticism, Anand has been able to back up his statements so far. The loss does put a lot of time between him and his next title match, but Moscow has also reflected gaps in the maestro’s opening preparation. Both Caruana and Hikaru Nakamura were able to trap him out of book in the English Opening, which led to quick and key defeats that hampered Anand’s campaign.

These gaps will need to be addressed by the Indian at home and with his team, and here as well, Anand’s remarkable ability gives him a minor edge. He is easily the best player of chess aided by computers (where you can use a computer to analyse ideas before making moves), having won the World Championship of Advanced Chess thrice. It will be interesting to see if any changes are made to his team, but Anand’s campaign – though dented – cannot written off by any means.