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Peter Svidler has been in good form in this year's World Cup Chess tournament. He has progressed to the final, where he plays Grischuk. Svidler beat Judit Polgar before eliminating Ruslan Ponomariov in an amazing show of strength, where Ponomariov's draw was declined in a very technical position. Incidentally, Svidler has been in great touch with the black pieces against formidable opponents. Here are the winning games in the most recent rounds. Polgar vs Svidler: Ponomariov vs Svidler:

It was as good a start as can be for the Indian Chess Players at the World Cup at Khanty Mansiysk. The much lower rated Sriram Jha and Abhijit Kunte held higher rated Grischuk and Shirov to draws. In other matches involving Indian players, Abhijit Gupta held Vitiugov, Ganguly beat Filippov, Negi upset Milov and Chanda beat Kobalia. Sasikiran was held to a draw by L'Ami. Official Site

Gata Kamsky won the World Cup Chess tournament 2007 being played at Khanty Mansiysk. What was expected to be a fiery battle in the end fizzled out into a draw by the 35th move. However, Kamsky was the one bound to break into a smile as he won $ 120 000. Shirov managed $ 80 000 in the end. Shirov did provoke Kamsky to fight a complicated battle. He offered a knight in the middle game but Kamsky declined it with his customary cool way and went on to sacrifice an exchange and then advance the dangerous e-pawn. The draw was agreed when Shirov could no longer prevent the perpetual thanks to Kamsky's queen. Kamsky now meets Veselin Topalov of Bulgaria for a chance to meet the winner of Vishwanathan Anand and Vladimir Kramnik. The eventual winner is to be considered the absolute World Champion.