Ivanchuk out of World chess Championship

Tripoli :

World Cup finalist Grandmaster Rustam Kasimdzhanov of Uzbekistan provided the biggest upset of the World Chess Championship by defeating European Champion Vassily Ivanchuk of Ukraine in the third round. Aeroflot Open champion Sergei Rublevsky of Russia also bowed out of the championship after losing his second straight game at the hands of Croatian Zdenko Kozul. Both Kozul and Dominiguez won with an identical score of 2-0 and did not need the tiebreak games as a decider. Sergei Movsesian of Slovakia halted Veselin Topalova€™s winning spree but the drawn result was enough to take the former to the pre-quarterfinals stage. Barring Ivanchuk's exit, there were no major surprises and it proved that the top players in the championship have adapted themselves quite well to the new FIDE time control and the knockout system. The stakes in the championship are quite high with the winner's purse being USD 100,000 while the loser of the third round will get USD 15,000. (PTI)