Anand retains joint lead

Linares:

Viswanathan Anand played out a fighting draw with Peter Svidler to remain in joint lead with Magnus Carlsen after the ninth round of Morelia-Linares tournament. After a rather sedate eighth round, there was a tough fight on all the boards. However, the day produced just one decisive game when Russian Alexander Morozevich came out with his first triumph in the event at the expense of Hungarian Peter Leko. Sixteen-year-old Magnus Carlsen played it safe as white against defending champion Levon Aronian of Armenia and continued to lead the tables surprisingly with just five more rounds to come in this categry-20 double round-robin event. Anand and Carlsen have 5.5 points apiece and they continued to be followed by Ivanchuk who missed some real winning chances against top seed Veselin Topalov of Bulgaria in his 9th round game. Aronian is in joint fourth spot on 4.5 points along with Svidler, who is the only unbeaten player in the tournament while Topalov is close behind them on four points. Leko and Morozevich are at the bottom of the tables on 3.5 points apiece.