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The Year 2005 in Review

The World's Best Players

The year 2005 in chess saw the first real progress since 2002 in resolving the World Championship schism. As in all our year end reviews, we owe a big debt to Mark Crowther's The Week in Chess (see the link on the right) and his global network of correspondents. Let's start by listing the world's top players, as calculated quarterly by FIDE. World's Top-10 (FIDE) 2005 Name NAT Born : Jan No : Apr No : Jul No : Oct No Kasparov, Garry RUS 1963 : 2804 1 : 2812 1 : 2812 1 : 2812 1 Anand, Viswanathan IND 1969 : 2786 2 : 2785 2 : 2788 2 : 2788 2 Topalov, Veselin BUL 1975 : 2757 3 : 2778 3 : 2788 3 : 2782 3 Leko, Peter HUN 1979 : 2749 5 : 2763 4 : 2763 4 : 2751 4 Ivanchuk, Vassily UKR 1969 : : 2739 6 : 2752 5 : 2748 5 Svidler, Peter RUS 1976 : 2735 8 : 2725 10 : 2738 7 : 2740 6 Kramnik, Vladimir RUS 1975 : 2754 4 : 2753 5 : 2744 6 : 2739 7 Polgar, Judit HUN 1976 : : 2732 8 : 2735 8 : 2735 8 Bacrot, Etienne FRA 1983 : 2715 9 : 2731 9 : 2729 9 : 2725 9 Aronian, Levon ARM 1982 : : : 2724 10 : 2724 10 Adams, Michael ENG 1971 : 2741 7 : 2737 7 : : Gelfand, Boris ISR 1968 : : : 2724 11 : Morozevich, Alexander RUS 1977 : 2741 6 : : : Shirov, Alexei ESP 1972 : 2713 10 : : : Kasparov, Anand, and Topalov held the 1-2-3 positions throughout the year. After Kasparov announced his retirement from chess in March, his rating was unchanged due to inactivity, and no other player had a real chance to challenge his no.1 position. Since a player remains active on FIDE's rating list for one year, Kasparov can be first dropped only from the April 2006 list. Topalov's performance at San Luis was good enough to propel him to a 2800+ rating and he will likely replace Kasparov as world no.1. Similarly, Polgar disappeared from the top-10 in January 2005 because of inactivity after November 2003. She was reinstated after playing at Wijk aan Zee in January 2005, where she gained a few points. The year saw Bacrot and Aronian on the list for the first time. Dannemann World Champion Kramnik, who had been rated world no.2 at the start of 2004, finished the year at no.7. The 2004 Chess Oscar was awarded by the Russian 64 Magazine to Anand. He gathered 5205 points, including 279 first place votes. Kasparov was runner-up (664 points, 60 1st), while the players who had contested the Dannemann World Championship finished third (Leko, 3485, 43) and fourth (Kramnik, 3344, 37). Next : World Championship 2005

More of this Feature • The Best Players • World Championship • International Events • National Championships • Opens • Computers • Passages  Related Resources • The Best Players 2004  Elsewhere on the Web • The Week in Chess