Anand is world chess champ

Viswanathan Anand defended his title as world chess champion by beating Veselin Topalov in the final game of their 12-game match today.

The match between Anand and Topalov was hard fought, partly because Topalov invoked a rule for the contest that forbids the players from offering draws to each other. The rule, named after the city where the match was being played, insured that there would be no short draws. As the match wore on and fatigue took a toll, both players began to make mistakes with greater frequency.

“Anand” was briefly a global Trending Topic on Twitter this afternoon, which was unexpected and nice.

• chess
• games
• Veselin Topalov
• Viswanathan Anand