Former World Champion Ruslan Ponomariov of Ukraine reserved his seat in the finals of the World Chess Cup with an emphatic 2-0 victory over Grandmaster Alexander Grischuk of Russia in the tie-break games of the semifinals that concluded in Khanty Mansiysk, Russia.
Having drawn both the games played under normal time control, Ponomariov had his task cut out in the rapid games and he won both of them to record a smashing 3-1 victory.
It may be recalled here that Ponomariov had won a similar event back in 2001 ahead of Viswanathan Anand but that time it was called the World Championship.
This time around this is only a qualification event for the next World Championship match tournament cycle for which the top ten, determined after the tie-breaker here, will qualify.
After the victory Ponomariov set up his finals clash with prolific Levon Aronian of Armenia who is also a former World Junior champion. Grischuk will now battle it for the 3rd-4th place with Etienne Bacrot of France who was beaten by Aronian earlier under the normal time control games.
In the fight for the 5th-8th places, Russian GM Evgeny Bareev edged out compatriot GM Sergei Rublevsky in the rapid tie-breaker and will now meet GM Boris Gelfand of Israel in the decider for the 5th place.
Rublevsky will meet Mikhail Gurevich of Belgium for the seventh place play off. The event carries a total prize pool of over USD 1.5 million out of which the winner will take home USD 80,000 after 20 per cent tax deductions by FIDE, the apex chess body.
The biggest draw in the next World Championship match tournament cycle will certainly be the newest qualifier after this round- Magnus Carlsen, the Norwegian teenager who defeated Russian GM Vladimir Malakhov to assure himself a place in the top ten.
For the ninth place play-off Carlsen will meet American Gata Kamsky, who is back to chess after a long hiatus but has proved beyond doubt that he is still a force to reckon with.
As many as five matches out of eight were stretched to the tie-breaker and out of them three were taken to the blitz games.
In the first rapid game against Grischuk, Ponomariov's tenacity in a difficult position proved crucial as the Russian blundered after enjoying the advantage for a major part of the game.
The fact that Grischuk played White had all the more impact as in the return game, the Russian tumbled and fumbled largely because of the pressure that engulfed him.
Malakhov started off his campaign in the tiebreak with a victory over Carlsen but the youngest participant left here bounced back to level scores and than gave an empahtic display in the ensuing blitz games to take the match by a 3.5-2.5 margin.
