“The future of Indian chess looks bright!” tweeted Anish Giri after 52-year-old Vishy Anand got off to a brilliant start in the Superbet Rapid & Blitz Poland tournament in Warsaw. Vishy beat his former second Radek Wojtaszek, then sacrificed a pawn to crush world no. 8 Wesley So, then crashed through against Anton Korobov's French to end the day in the sole lead on a perfect 6/6. 

Vishy Anand's coaching of the Indian juniors seemed to have rubbed off on him as he raced to a brilliant 6/6 | photo: Lennart Ootes, Grand Chess Tour 

The 10 Superbet Rapid & Blitz Poland players at the Opening Ceremony in Warsaw | photo: Lennart Ootes, Grand Chess Tour 

You can replay all the games from the Superbet Rapid and Blitz Poland using the selector below.

And here’s the day’s live commentary with Peter Svidler, Yasser Seirawan, Alejandro Ramirez, Cristian Chirila and Anastasia Karlovich.

The 2nd event on the Grand Chess Tour, the Superbet Rapid and Blitz, is taking place in the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews in the Polish capital Warsaw. The war just across the border, and a huge influx of refugees, means that the history particularly of World War II has become more relevant than ever. 13th World Champion Garry Kasparov met with Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki to discuss Russia’s invasion.

He also appeared on Polish TV.

Garry was mainly in Warsaw, however, for the opening ceremony of the Superbet Rapid and Blitz.

Garry Kasparov with the two Polish stars in the tournament, Jan-Krzysztof Duda and Radosław Wojtaszek | photo: Lennart Ootes, Grand Chess Tour 

The 10-player field features two Ukrainian players, the mercurial Anton Korobov and the 19-year-old rising star Kirill Shevchenko. On Day 1 of the event, however, it was 52-year-old Vishy Anand who stole the show (the following crosstable will update as the event continues).

Vishy Anand began by beating his long-time second Radek Wojtaszek in a tricky game where Radek might have had compensation for a missing piece, but couldn’t find the narrow path to prove it. Then Vishy won a remarkable game in the Nimzo-Indian when Wesley So castled into trouble with 12.0-0-0!?

Vishy lost no time to launch an attack with 12…b5! 13.e4 b4 and soon Wesley was taking huge risks just to survive. He grabbed a pawn on c6, then found the computer’s recommended 24.e6!?, giving up a pawn to stop the f8-knight coming to e6 (24…Nxe6 25.Qxh7+).

Vishy was still applying all the pressure, however, and Wesley was unable to find a convincing path before he resigned on move 30.

Next up was Anton Korobov, who is always fun to interview.

Anton felt that Vishy might be tempted simply to play solidly after winning the first two games, but Anton did nothing to encourage that scenario by playing the French Defence. Vishy accepted the challenge!

The game lasted a long time, but not in terms of moves, since after 25...f4 26.gxf4 fxe6 27.Rg3 Anton spent 11 minutes on 27...Qxh4? only to find himself lost after 28.Qe5! 

After 28...Rc4 Anton resigned before waiting for e.g. 29.Rxg6+. 

Fabiano Caruana won this game against Jan-Krzysztof Duda, but both are in the chasing pack on 4/6. They're joined by Levon Aronian, the only player other than Vishy still unbeaten in Warsaw | photo: Lennart Ootes, Grand Chess Tour 

There are two more days of rapid chess to go, before the final two days will feature 18 rounds of blitz. Follow all the Superbet Rapid & Blitz action live here on chess24 from 14:00 CEST. 

See also:

• Official website
• Superbet Rapid & Blitz Poland games on chess24