Q: Is it correct to say that you don’t regard the new World Champion as an elite chess player, do you?
A: I don’t.
Q: What prevented you from proving it by winning the match?
A: There were a number of reasons. First, Ponomariov turned out to be the most uncomfortable opponent for me. He was some sort of a dark horse, a mysterious imp darted out from a snuffbox. The second reason is geographical. We are both Ukrainians. It means that subconsciously I had not only to fight for the title, but also to defend my unofficial status as the best Ukrainian chess player. My opponent felt no discomfort about the latter – even defeat in the match would not have jeopardized his reknown as the second GM in Ukraine. On the other hand, I had something to lose; it put some extra pressure on me.
Q: Many from the outside had the impression that you stopped fighting after the fifth game, in which you lost in a winning position.
A: No, I did not accept defeat in the match at this point. I struggled as hard as I could, but unfortunately I relied more on luck rather then on my chess strengths. Clearly I was wrong.
Q: What happened in game five?
A: Mysticism.
Q: I noted that you often resorted to this very word when explaining your mistakes at the press conferences?
A: Because it reflects the essence of the match very well. Mysticism and farce – these two “dishes” supplement each other.
Q: What are other factors behind your defeat?
A: My victory over Anand. Don’t be surprised – when I beat the champion of 2000-2001 I felt myself the champion of 2001-2002. When I came back home to Lvov, the people greeted me as the holder of the title. I realized that a hard match with a tough opponent lay ahead of me, but tried to push this idea to the back of my mind. It was a strange feeling, as if I already had the chess crown, but still had to win another match for this very crown. It was a hard, almost impossible mission.
Q: Did you communicate with Ponomariov in the course of the match?
A: I did not. Let me tell you a funny story, which characterizes our relationship pretty well. Once I offered to play 100-square checkers with Ruslan. We were in unequal conditions at this point: I know and understand this game rather well, whereas Ponomariov was a rookie. That’s why I perceived myself as the favorite and let my opponent take a couple of his bad moves back. At some moment I made a move and to my horror noticed that it led to my forced defeat. I broke into a cold sweat. The very thought that I might lose to him was a real nightmare for me. I can lose to anyone, but not to him! Ponomariov thought for about three minutes on his move. I was in a stupor all this time. Finally my opponent missed the winning continuation; I braced myself together and gradually outclassed him. I remembered this case in the course of the match, but unfortunately failed to draw the necessary lesson. The lesson goes like this: the very thought of being inferior to Ponomariov in any game horrifies me. For example, why did I play the first game so poorly? Simply because I could not imagine that I was capable of losing exactly to him. Any chess player of my level knows, that he is losing 3-4 moves before resigning. I did not realize it up to the final position. Isn’t that the mysticism?
Q: Did the fact that Ponomariov had such a brilliant player as Veselin Topalov as his second put you on your guard?
A: No, because Topalov is an energetic vampire in his mould. I am not sure that their work did Ponomariov any good, but I am confident that Topalov greatly benefited from it. The situation around the Bulgarian GM just did not go my way. Ponomariov announced that his seconds were Topalov and Danailov at the press-conference before the match. I perceived this statement as some sort of provocation. I thought that the journalist, who allegedly worked for Ponomariov’s team, did not ask this question about his second out of the blue. So I decided that the work with Topalov was a mere myth aimed (according to the plan of Ponomariov’s team) at unbalancing me. This explanation seemed satisfactory to me and I thought that I had got to the truth. Then there was a terrible mishap – I accidentally spotted the Bulgarian GM in the playing hall in the course of the first game. Nothing fatal would have happened if I had met him before the game or afterwards. However, it was a hard blow to me at that point. It meant that Ponomariov’s words were not disinformation; the Bulgarian really worked on his team. “What did they analyze at their training session, what novelties did they invent?” I thought during the game. As a result, my thoughts strayed away from the game. Eventually that took its toll.
Q: Would you have called all that happend a farce if you had become the winner of the match?
A: I don’t know. Probably I would have had a different perception of this match, but I don’t know what it would have been. What feelings does a person have when he is laurelled? I had an unpleasant association with funerals. If I had become the World Champion I would have asked to exclude this indispensable attribute from the final ceremony. However, there is a flip side of the coin. When I asked Ponomariov what did he feel when laurelled, he said: “a very pleasant sense, evoking euphoria”. It was a surprise to me.
Q: Your relationships with Ponomariov will hardly be friendly, will they?
A: We had no special relationship, although as far as I remember once we went to the movie “Titanic”. I never wished him bad and I don’t right now. It was very unpleasant to me to find out that Ruslan contracted a cold from me in the course of the match.
Q: What can you say about the FIDE president? Could you give an single-meaning appraisal (positive or negative) of this person?
A: I can’t. People are too complex to be only good or only bad. Ilumzhinov is no exception to this rule. One thing I want to say is that chess is very lucky to have such a president. I realized it a few years ago when I talked the 100-square checkers World Champion Harm Virsma. He wanted to meet Ilumzhinov. When I asked why, he gave me a detailed explanation, from which it became clear what bedlam the world of checkers was. I realized back then that the chess players who keep complaining in reality are sawing the branch on which they are sitting. They think that they are having troubles but just don’t understand what real troubles are all about.
Q: It is time to ask about the knockout system. So do you agree with those who state that in order to become the World Champion under this system it is not enough to simply play chess better than anyone else?
A: I do. It is necessary to have a good draw. It is necessary to have the people around you who fit the specific situation. Besides, you need the intuition to take right (and not only chess) decisions. I fully realize now that I committed a fatal mistake when I skipped the press conferences after my defeats. You must agree that I was better than my opponent in this sort of competition. It is not because I am smarter, I am just older and more experienced than my opponent. At the age of 18 I would have looked at such press conferences no better than Ruslan, but being 33-years old I could have given Rulsan huge odds if I wanted. I should have taken advantage of this situation, but I did not do it. Why? Because of a simple stereotype that any chess player is such a vulnerable and touchy creature that he or she just can’t answer clever or idiotic questions from journalists after his or her defeat. Had I faced Karpov, this approach would have been right, but the point is that I was playing Ponomariov. We were informed before the match that we had to attend the press conferences in case of draws and victories. A question popped up in my mind immediately. “Can the person who just lost attend the press-conference?” I asked. “He can, but we spare the finalists’ feelings and nerves,” was the answer. Later I comprehended that this question was send to me by God. It was some sort of a guide to action. Unfortunately I realized it too late.
Q: Let me contribute to the list of idiotic questions. Do you feel capable of showing a better result at the next championship?
A: This question is not idiotic. I would say that you don’t take into account my specific character. I weakly fancy what I am going to do tomorrow. I don’t know what will happen in a year, let alone two years. If I could learn my future, I would not do it. What for? If something good is going to happen to me, let it be a nice surprise for me. If something bad is going to befall me, than it is better not to know about it beforehand.
Q: Many journalists described your performance at FIDE KO as the last chance to win the title. Do you agree with them?
A: Certainly not. For me such a statement is just another evidence of a strange tendency: it turns out that it is not necessary for a journalist to be an intelligent and tactful person nowadays. I know what I am talking about, because I am a journalist in a certain sence – I have a column in one of the Ukrainian newspapers. I would never permit myself to write that a 33-year old man had lost his last chance to achieve anything.
Q: In what way did you change compared to the three previous championships in which you flopped?
A: I have been working a lot on my psychological stability. It had to yield fruits, but the real leap fell on this year.
Q: Should the World Champion be a harmonious, all-round person?
A: I think so, but there are a few amazing exceptions to this rule. For example, Ruslan is not a harmonious person by virtue of his age, but I have no doubt that he will become one sometime.
Q: What about the ex-champion Vishy Anand, is he a harmonious person in your opinion?
A: I don’t know. He lost the semifinal match. There is a share of his fault and there is a share of my merit in this outcome. I think the ratio is about 10 to 90. Let me confide in you that I was crazy about beating the Indian GM before the event. I did not know whether I would be able to reach the semifinal, but I was dreaming about winning over Anand. It happened. By the way, I beat him not even from the chessic, but from the human standpoint.
Q: What occurred in the decisive fourth game?
A: I had a slightly inferior position in the opening, although I did not allow my opponent to obtain any serious advantage. Then something inconceivable happened. As if Anand was substituted with someone else. I mean Anand was sitting at the board, but it seemed to me that someone else, who had a mediocre notion about chess, was making the moves instead of the Indian GM. Let me note that Anand had no time problems whatsoever. I remember a similar episode in my game with Kasparov in Zurich. I was defending an inferior endgame, which arose in a bulletproof variation of the French Defense. All of the sudden the fight was over: Kasparov disappeared in a similar way. Someone else took over and stared making the moves of an under-2000 player. Back then I compared Garry Kimovich with a plane that run out of fuel in the middle of the flight. The same analogy is suited for Anand in the fourth game of our semifinal. Anand failed to see the possession and determination in my eyes. It was his fault. Vishy did not feel how eager I was to beat him. In order to fight with the player I was in December, one should be absolutely uninhibited. However Anand subconsciously kept clinging to his property – the champion title! Here is another story about the fourth game of the semifinal. I accidentally dropped in the gym where the Indian was warming up at that point. I noticed Anand and greeted him with the wave of my hand. All of the sudden I saw the animal fear in his eyes, the fear of a person dreading defeat. I realized at that point that I had scored victory before the game.
BG Champion Vladimir Kramnik had his own opinion about R. Ponomariov and FIDE: ”I have no trouble accepting Ponomariov as the title holder of a knockout competition with the character of a high-class Grand Prix. In this sense I have no problem to accept the title of FIDE world champion for him. Ponomariov made a great performance in Moscow, but he is definitely not the World Chess Champion in the classical sense. No way. There are very few players in the world who could achieve my title. Maybe Ponomariov would be able to do so, but he must prove that. In the FIDE format there were 20 or 30 players who would have been able to win this tournament. The system does not consider the playing strength of the individual players sufficiently. This was made worse by the shortened time controls.”
Q: Will FIDE be interested in a reunification match?
A: Perhaps you should ask FIDE this question. In my opinion a reunification match for the world championship is currently purely hypothetical. I am in favour of classical chess. I want to keep the tradition and beauty of the game. Naturally it is possible to present chess in many different formats, and to market it in many different ways. I do not object to this. But chess is much more than only a sport. In order to create a work of art a player needs time. And that is only possible in the classical time controls. If you remove the beauty and deepness of chess it becomes a circus act. This makes it less attractive and less valuable for sponsors. The quality of the games in Moscow were correctly criticized. Sometimes it was unbearable. In chess not only the result counts, especially when it is a world championship. The great world championship matches in classical chess always had the biggest prizes and the biggest audiences. They did a lot for the development of the game. FIDE has simply abandoned this area of chess.
After winning the FIDE world championship, Ruslan Ponomariov has immediately become a “public figure”. After Linares where he was invited to play his first ‘Super’ Tournament the new world Champion answered few questions:
Q: I don’t think that many would take a chance and play in Linares right after winning a title. With no rest and no special preparations you played against guys like Kasparov, Anand, and Shirov!
A: Well, there is no doubt it was a risky step! You may just imagine how the chess world would have reacted if I had failed….Everybody would just say “and that’s how he really plays!?” But it’s against my rules to hide from danger, espacially after accusations by the organizers of Linares of being a coward!
Q: Afterwards they apologized and asked you to take part in the tournament. Some people decided that it was a kind of a trap!
A: I just play play chess and don’t care about the politics around the game!
Q: Is Kasparov really invincible? He just won 10 supertournaments in a row!
A:I don’t think we should refer to Kasparov as to a super-human! He is just a regular guy who is extremly strong in chess, so I wouldn’t point out 2 games played against him as something extraordinary. For me they were just another 2 tournament games. Apparently the journalists didn’t think so! Especially our second game: even at the world championships we see so many of them around my table! Eventually it was all decided over the board: in the opening I lost my concentration a bit and made an inaccuracy, which proved to be lethal.
Q: What conclusions did you draw after the loss?
A: I just understood that a lot of work still has to be done!
Q: Which tournament was more dificult for you, the world championship or Linares?
A: All tournaments of such levels are extremly difficult, that’s why the issues of what you are fighting for and what you might eventually achieve are of great importance. There was a title and a lot of prize money in Moscow, meanwhile you have nothing special in Linares…So you can draw a conclusion by yourself!
Q: Your first opponent in Linares was Ivanchuk. For him it was a chance to take revenge for his loss in Moscow. Did this game have a special meaning for you?
A: Nothing special. I just wanted to make a good start to be in the right mood for the rest of the tournament. I knew that Ivanchuk would try to win at any cost and took advantage of it: when he opened up his position a bit too much I managed to launch a strong counterattack and win the game.
Q: Nothing special, you say?! But after losing the final in Moscow, Ivanchuk made different statements (and not just once) claiming that you were just lucky to win the match and next time he is going to show you who is the boss! Didn’t you feel offended by this?
A: I think Vassily was just being overemotional, so I don’t feel offended by this. Whatever chess players might say, there always is a chessboard and only over the chessboard may you prove that you are better than somebody!