Chess

THE annual Melody Amber tournament, now on the French Riviera in Nice, is both gimmicky and irresistible. Take a dozen of the world's top grandmasters, and you put them in a unique playing format with no rating points at stake.

The result is a fair helping of horrific blunders but also some of the most engaging and eccentric chess played on the top circuit from players who are usually more reserved and very protective of their rating, and who don't go in for speculative sacrificial chess.

Yesterday's game from Vassily Ivanchuk, with the stunning queen sacrifice was an exception, as the Ukrainian is capable of playing this way at any given time and against any opponent. But not so Peter "Interesting" Leko, who went wild by ripping into world champion Vishy Anand with the no-holds barred Perenyi Attack.

Hungarian Bela Perenyi's claim to fame is introducing to praxis one of the sharpest lines known to opening theory. Unfortunately he died tragically young of a car accident in 1988 without ever seeing his line tested at elite levels – but his name lives on with his intriguing knight sacrifice that takes the game into another dimension.

And this rare mauling of Anand in the rapids gave up his position at the top after four rounds of the Amber tournament. The defeat, coming on the eve of the first rest day, saw the world champion slip to fourth in the combined standings.

Combined standings: 1-3. Topalov, Aronian and Ivanchuk, 5/8; 4. Anand, 4.5; 5-7. Leko, Carlsen and Kramnik, 4; 8-10. van Wely, Mamedyarov and Karjakin, 3.5; 11-12. Gelfand and Morozevich, 3.

P Leko – V Anand

Amber Rapid, (4)

Sicilian Najdorf, Perenyi Attack

1 e4 c5 2 Nf3 d6 3 d4 cxd4 4 Nxd4 Nf6 5 Nc3 a6 6 Be3 e6 7 g4 e5 8 Nf5 g6 9 g5 gxf5 10 exf5 d5 11 Qf3 d4 12 0-0-0 Nbd7 13 Bc4 Qc7 14 Bxd4 exd4 15 Rhe1+ Kd8 16 Rxd4 Bc5 17 Rdd1 Re8 18 gxf6 Rxe1 19 Rxe1 Nxf6 20 Rd1+ Bd7 21 Bxf7 Qxh2 22 Nd5! Rc8 23 Be6 Bxf2 24 c3 Rc7 25 Nxf6 Qh6+ 26 Kb1 Qxf6 27 Qxf2 Ke8 28 Qg3 1-0