FIDE Knockout Tournaments

The chess world is divided into two camps : those who accept the FIDE
Knockout tournament as a real world chess championship and those who
don't. Both camps use logic and reason to justify their point of
view, but, as with so much in chess, logic and reason ultimately
succumb to faith and passion. Since I'm in the first camp, I'm going
to use this review to discuss the page...

World Chess Championship : FIDE Knockout Statistics
http://www.mark-weeks.com/chess/sta-3wko.htm

...I created the page a few months ago as part of the preparation
that went into my review of Chess Informant's 'Chess Is Chess' CD...

Chess History on the Web (2001 no.17)
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Chess_History/message/7

...While waiting for the last round of the current FIDE Moscow
tournament, I incorporated the results of the first six rounds into
the statistics that I'd calculated for the three previous knockout
tournaments.

I reused the database and queries that I constructed to analyze the
Chess Informant (CI) data, but this time I based my calculations on
my own PGN files instead of the Chess Informant files. This gave me
the opportunity to check the sources against each other. Most of the
results compared perfectly, although I discovered some discrepancies
with the CI file for 1999 Las Vegas event.

The 1999 event was marred by first round forfeits when two players
(Bagheri & Hakki) from Middle Eastern countries were unable to
procure visas to enter the United States. The CI data included one
game for each player, while my files have two games. I decided to
ignore all games from both matches for statistics. This meant, among
other changes, that I count only 98 players for the event instead of
the 100 shown by official records. For the same event the CI data was
missing three games from the first round; Dolmatov - Kotsur had 3
games instead of 4, while Macieja - Milov had 2 games instead of 4. I
included these games in the new calculations.

The 2001 Moscow tournament had more players (128) and consequently
more games (401) than any previous event. The number of players
increased because FIDE stopped granting second round seeds to the
strongest players. The number of games will increase again when the
final round is played later this month. The last match is scheduled
to be 8 standard games. If the match is tied, the first tiebreak will
be 4 rapid games (20 minutes per player + 10 seconds per move); if
still tied, 2 blitz games (5 min. + 10 sec. per move); if still tied,
sudden death blitz games.

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How have Ivanchuk & Ponomariov, who will meet in the final round,
fared in previous knockout events? Ivanchuk has played in all four
events, while Ponomariov has played in the last three. The following
is a summary of their results.

2001 Ivanchuk:-
- Rd.1 +1-0=1 vs. Shovunov
- Rd.2 +3-1=0 vs. Macieja
- Rd.3 +1-0=1 vs. Sutovsky
- Rd.4 +1-0=1 vs. Ye Jiangchuan
- Rd.5 +1-0=5 vs. Lautier
- Rd.6 +1-0=3 vs. Anand
2001 Ponomariov:-
- Rd.1 +1-0=1 vs. Li Wenliang
- Rd.2 +2-0=2 vs. Tiviakov
- Rd.3 +2-0=0 vs. Georgiev
- Rd.4 +2-1=1 vs. Morozevich
- Rd.5 +2-0=2 vs. Bareev
- Rd.6 +1-0=3 vs. Svidler

2000 Ivanchuk:-
- Rd.1 seeded directly into the 2nd round
- Rd.2 +0-1=3 vs. Ehlvest
2000 Ponomariov:-
- Rd.1 +0-1=1 vs. Dao Thien Hai

1999 Ivanchuk:-
- Rd.1 seeded directly into the 2nd round
- Rd.2 +2-0=0 vs. Wahls
- Rd.3 +2-0=0 vs. Shipov
- Rd.4 +0-1=3 vs. Nisipeanu
1999 Ponomariov:-
- Rd.1 +1-0=1 vs. Al Modiahki
- Rd.2 +1-3=2 vs. Topalov

1997 Ivanchuk:-
- Rd.1 seeded directly into the 2nd round
- Rd.2 +0-1=0 vs. Seirawan

Ivanchuk's quest for the title started in the 1990 Manila Interzonal
tournament, where he tied for 1st/2nd with Gelfand, finishing +6-1=6
after losing his 1st round game to Chandler. In the subsequent 1991
Candidates matches, he crushed Yudasin +4-0=1 in the preliminary
match, but lost to Yusupov +2-3=5 in the quarterfinal match. The
second match went into tiebreak with +2-2=4 after the standard games.
Game 9, the deciding game of the match, was one of the wildest games
ever seen in a world championship competition. In 1996, it was voted
one of the best 10 games of the first 30 years of the Chess Informant
publication.

In the last of the old style FIDE qualifying cycles, Ivanchuk was
eliminated after the 1993 Biel FIDE Interzonal tournament, where he
tied for 10th-15th with +3-0=10. The first 10 players were seeded
into the candidates. Anand was the only qualifier from the group at
8.0 points due to his superior tiebreak. Ivanchuk officially finished
14th.

If experience counts, then Ivanchuk has the edge in the match against
Ponomariov. If nerves count, then anything can happen. Ivanchuk's 4th
round loss to Nisipeanu in 1999 was due to a simple oversight on his
13th move.

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Along with the two finalists, 244 other players have competed in at
least one knockout event. While 30 players competed in each of the
first three knockout events, the number dropped to 25 for all four.
The five veterans who missed the latest event were Adianto, Akopian,
Aleksandrov, Almasi, and Peng Xiaomin. Akopian has gone as far as the
finals, where he lost in 1999 to Khalifman.

What about the rookies? 51 players not seen in any of the previous
three events competed in Moscow. 34 of them were knocked out in the
1st round and 12 in the 2nd. Delchev, Zhang Zhong, Motylev, & Pigusov
survived to the 3rd round. Ye Jiangchuan took unofficial honors as
the best rookie by surviving to the 4th round. He beat Barsov,
Psakhis, and Van Wely before losing to Ivanchuk +0-1=1. Also worth
noting is that Zhang Pengxiang, another rookie, knocked out ex-World
Champion Karpov in the 1st round.

The list of most active players, determined by total games played,
saw few changes. The top four players held their positions -- 1st
Adams (67 games in the first three events -> 81 games in all four),
2nd Khalifman (58 -> 70), 3rd Anand (51 -> 69), and 4th Shirov (48 ->
67) -- while Gelfand (38 -> 56) replaced Dreev (42 -> 50) in the 5th
position. Akopian and Short, who dropped off the list, were replaced
by Svidler and Lautier. Anand is the only player on the top ten list
to have played in less than 4 events. The current 9th and 10th
positions -- Tkachiev (44 games) and Lautier (42) -- might be
replaced by Ivanchuk (34) and Ponomariov (30) after the final round
is played.

Not too surprisingly, the same names show up with the best overall
results. This is because a successful player survives into the next
round and plays more games. Anand tops the list of the 72 players who
have played more than 11 games. His score of +17-4=14 with White and
+7-2=25 with Black give him an overall percentage of 63.0%. Ivanchuk
is 6th on the list with W:+8-1=8 B:+4-3=10 61.8%, while Ponomariov is
7th with W:+8-1=6 B:+4-4=7 61.7%.

Of the 25 players who have played in all four events, Bareev tops the
list with W:+11-2=7 B:+7-6=7 62.5%. Hamdouchi is at the bottom with
W:+0-4=1 B:+0-3=2 15.0%. In 1997, he was knocked out +0-2=0 in the
1st round by Malaniuk. In 1999, he won the 1st round by forfeit
against Hakki, but lost the 2nd to Beliavsky +0-1=1. In 2000, he lost
in the 1st round to Vaganian +0-2=0. Hamdouchi's best result was in
the 2001 event where in the 1st round he played two draws in standard
games against Tkachiev, but lost both rapidplay tiebreak games.

The last statistic I worked out is what I call 'the rivalries',
opponents who have played each other the most. The top position after
the first three events was taken by Adams - Anand, who have played 13
games in two matches. The first match was in 1997, when Anand won in
the semifinal round; after draws in the four standard games and in
both sets of two-game tiebreaks, he won the first sudden death game.
The second match was in 2000, when Anand again won in the semifinal
round with +1-0=3 in the four standard games.

The top rivalry is now Adams - Svidler, who have played a total of 16
games against each other in the 4th rounds of 1997, 2000, & 2001.
Adams won the first two matches, but Svidler turned the tide in
Moscow. All three matches were decided in tiebreak.

Anand & Shirov have also met three times, but their game count
doesn't make my rivalries list. Shirov has lost each time in the
standard games, making the tiebreak unnecessary. Other opponents who
have met twice are Adams - Kobalija, Almasi - Peng Xiaomin, Anand -
Khalifman, Bareev - Ehlvest, Beliavsky - Short, Gelfand - Lautier,
and Milos - Shirov.

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What about the FIDE Women's Knockout tournament? Since there have
been only two events held, I haven't included any statistics on my
page covering the knockout events. The 2000 New Delhi event had 61
players and 160 games, while the 2001 Moscow event had 64 players and
183 games. A total of 101 different players has competed in the two
events, 24 players in both events. Six women have played 20 or more
games:-
29 Zhu Chen
27 Peng Zhaoqin
26 Xu Yuhua
22 Skripchenko,A
20 Kosteniuk,A
20 Maric,A

In none of the 123 matches have the same opponents met in more than
one match. Of the 23 players with more than 9 games, the most
successful have been:-
Xie Jun W:+4-0=4 B:+1-0=7 65.6%
Zhukova,N W:+3-0=2 B:+1-1=3 65.0%
Kosteniuk,A W:+6-2=2 B:+6-4=0 65.0%
Qin Kanying W:+5-0=4 B:+1-1=7 63.9%
Skripchenko,A W:+5-3=3 B:+6-2=3 63.6%
Peng Zhaoqin W:+9-2=3 B:+6-6=1 63.0%
Peptan,C W:+3-1=4 B:+4-2=2 62.5%
Zhu Chen W:+8-3=4 B:+5-3=6 62.1%
Kovalevskaya,E W:+4-0=5 B:+2-2=4 61.8%
Xu Yuhua W:+6-2=5 B:+5-3=5 61.5%

All four finalists -- 2000 champion Xie Jun & runnerup Qin Kanying,
plus 2001 champion Zhu Chen & runnerup Alexandra Kosteniuk -- appear
on the list. If you're interested in the history of the Women's World
Championship, I've just recently constructed an index of all the
players who have competed in women's title competitions since 1950...

World Chess Championship : Index of women players
http://www.mark-weeks.com/chess/wcc-plwo.htm

...I'll add the missing crosstables and game scores as time and
resources permit.

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Here's wishing you a happy, healthy, and prosperous 2002. Bye for now,
Mark Weeks