Anand retains World Champion crown

[VP]

congrats

[Mike S.]

YAWN²

I guess this was the most boring WCh ever. Let's forget it fast...

[Dr.Wael Deeb]

An expected outcome

[Dr. Axel Schumacher]

YAWN²

I guess this was the most boring WCh ever. Let's forget it fast...

Exactly.
My suggestion to FIDE is to increase the stakes for the players to give more incentives to produce entertaining chess.

1. More games. The winner should win at least 6 games.
2. The winner gets a Bobby Fischer "I'm a Genius; a REAL Genius" WC memorial medal
3. The looser of the match gets tarred and feathered, driven out of town, bound naked to a donkey
4. After the match, the winner will find 72 virgins in his hotel room, unless he is gay, in which case he will sent to a monastery.

Please post other "improvements", which we then can present to FIDE.

A.

[Norm Pollock]

Was it really "boring" or has chess evolved to the point where winning in match play, at the top level, has become more difficult?

We should not confuse match play with round-robin tournaments where winning and therefore taking risks, is essential to finishing in the money. Match play is such that one loss and you might be done. With round-robin, everyone is taking risks so there is a much greater chance to recover from a loss.

[Dr. Axel Schumacher]

Was it really "boring" or has chess evolved to the point where winning in match play, at the top level, has become more difficult?

We should not confuse match play with round-robin tournaments where winning and therefore taking risks, is essential to finishing in the money. Match play is such that one loss and you might be done. With round-robin, everyone is taking risks so there is a much greater chance to recover from a loss.

Since we have not solved chess, it should not be more difficult to win games in such a match.
Maybe its due to the character of the involved players. I guess neither Anand nor Gelfand are crazy enough to exhibit extraordinary game play in those circumstances. So it is difficult to blame them. Players such as Fischer or Morphy were certainly more charismatic and entertaining. But then it would also not be advisable to any top player to follow their paths.
Nevertheless, I could not find much interest in those games. Not surprisingly, the match did barely receive any attention in the mainstream news.
That leaves us with the idea of the virgins....

[Werewolf]

YAWN²

I guess this was the most boring WCh ever. Let's forget it fast...

Exactly.
My suggestion to FIDE is to increase the stakes for the players to give more incentives to produce entertaining chess.

1. More games. The winner should win at least 6 games.
2. The winner gets a Bobby Fischer "I'm a Genius; a REAL Genius" WC memorial medal
3. The looser of the match gets tarred and feathered, driven out of town, bound naked to a donkey
4. After the match, the winner will find 72 virgins in his hotel room, unless he is gay, in which case he will sent to a monastery.

Please post other "improvements", which we then can present to FIDE.

A.

All we need is for Carlsen to play and mince him. Why isn't he playing by the way?

[shiv]

YAWN²

I guess this was the most boring WCh ever. Let's forget it fast...

Exactly.
My suggestion to FIDE is to increase the stakes for the players to give more incentives to produce entertaining chess.

1. More games. The winner should win at least 6 games.
2. The winner gets a Bobby Fischer "I'm a Genius; a REAL Genius" WC memorial medal
3. The looser of the match gets tarred and feathered, driven out of town, bound naked to a donkey
4. After the match, the winner will find 72 virgins in his hotel room, unless he is gay, in which case he will sent to a monastery.

Please post other "improvements", which we then can present to FIDE.

A.

I like suggestion #4!

This match was actually replete with many novelties and not necessarily that boring.
However, it was disappointing especially for Anand for a number of reasons:

1. Anand was not in top form in 2011 and was not confident to play too sharply.
2. Anand probably lacks motivation after getting so many titles. Although, I do not understand why he does not care about being the #1 rated player. Perhaps its a consequence of #1.
3. Gelfand is a solid player and does not want to take undue risks against Anand. Prior to this match, he did not beat Anand since 1993 in a classical game.
4. For players of this level, financial rewards do not mean that much. Money is not known to be a good motivator anyway.

I don't know what the best solution is. Someone has proposed doing away with matches altogether and make the game of chess similar to tennis. Long matches really test out how each team has prepared the openings rather than solely testing skill.

I like the idea of tiebreaks before the games. However, having the champion go to the semi-finals (like the next version) instead of the finals also makes sense.

[Guenther]

This match was actually replete with many novelties and not necessarily that boring.
However, it was disappointing especially for Anand for a number of reasons:

1. Anand was not in top form in 2011 and was not confident to play too sharply.
2. Anand probably lacks motivation after getting so many titles. Although, I do not understand why he does not care about being the #1 rated player. Perhaps its a consequence of #1.
3. Gelfand is a solid player and does not want to take undue risks against Anand. Prior to this match, he did not beat Anand since 1993 in a classical game.
4. For players of this level, financial rewards do not mean that much. Money is not known to be a good motivator anyway.

I don't know what the best solution is. Someone has proposed doing away with matches altogether and make the game of chess similar to tennis. Long matches really test out how each team has prepared the openings rather than solely testing skill.

I like the idea of tiebreaks before the games. However, having the champion go to the semi-finals (like the next version) instead of the finals also makes sense.

IMHO it was an interesting WCC but in most part not too entertaining for
the spectators, because both were very good prepared and Gelfand
even seemed to have upper hand most of the time in preparation.
(I agree that Anand probably was not in his best shape and somehow
seemed not motivated enough, no idea why)
Actually he(Gelfand) practically only lost due to a very unhealthy time management
in the rapid games.

Guenther

[MM]

YAWN²

I guess this was the most boring WCh ever. Let's forget it fast...

The times of Bobby Fischer and Garry Kasparov won't never return.
In the era of the computers, there are a huge number of Gm that are Gm only for the opening preparation and some general chess knowledge.

I would be curious to see them playing at chess960 to see how good they would be without their opening home preparation.

I don't think it is a problem of formula.

I think it is a problem of players.

I think only Carlsen and Kramnik can be someway compared with the generation of Petrosjan, Spassky, Geller, Botvinnik, Bronstein, Stein, Tal and...Bobby Fischer.

Best Regards