St. Louis: Indian ace Viswanathan Anand let slip some crucial chances against old nemesis Garry Kasparov as the Russian great stretched his lead to five points with two wins and as many draws on the penultimate day of their much-hyped showdown in the Clutch Chess Legends here.
Kasparov was lucky to clinch the first game as disaster struck Anand at a close-to-winning position when the Indian ran out of time after “forgetting” to keep an eye on the clock.
In one of the two blitz games of the day, Kasparov again won the first game to lead 8.5-3.5 going in to the final day of the $144,000 prize money event.
With four games still to come in the 12-game match, it is still not over for Anand because of the newly-introduced format. On the last day each victory will be worth three points for the winner while a draw will be worth 1.5 points.
Theoretically, Anand can still win the match by winning two games on the final day in the chess-960 format -- where the initial position of the pieces is selected through a random drawing of lots.