Over the next few weeks we are going to be looking at games by the world champion Vishy Anand. He recently regained the no 1 spot on the rating list, so this seems a fitting moment to feature his play. His depth and speed of calculation marked him out as a special talent in his youth, and he has lost none of that sharpness in his maturity.
RB What is the white knight doing on g5? This was the first thing to strike me when Dan sent me this position. Has it just captured a piece? Has it been trapped? Has there been a whole series of bloody exchanges on that square? Is it a time-pressure blunder? I couldn't work it out, so I looked up the game on chessgames.com and saw that, no, actually, Short has just played the knight from a safe square – h3 – to its present perilous location, and he would only have done so if he believed the piece was immune. The trouble is, I don't believe it. I say trouble because I am a long way behind Short.
You can see at once how, after taking on g5, Black could end up with connected pawns on h4, g5 and f5, which would be very nice. But you can also see a little problem, which I ran into at the first attempt: 1...hxg5 2 fxg5 Nxg5, and immediately you get the point – 3 Qxh4+, with a very bleak future for the black king. Does that mean the knight is immune? I think Short miscalculated because I don't see anything wrong with 1...Nxg5 2 fxg5 hxg5, when Black is simply a pawn up.
DK Black might be a pawn up, but with his king exposed it's not so simple. Short continued with a further sacrifice: 3 Bxg5 Bxg5 4 Qe2, threatening a check on h5, which he thought was winning. But Anand had seen a step further: 4...Qd6 is the only move, but it's good enough. After 5 Qh5+ Qh6 blocked and the attack was over. All planned by Anand before he took the knight on g5.
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