Now the Bulgarian's chequered career has taken another strong upswing. His superb tournament form in the second half of 2008 this week raised him back to No1 in the rankings, ahead of the world champion, Vishy Anand. Moreover, Topalov's latest impressive first prize at the Pearl Spring tournament in Nanjung, China, came after the ratings deadline. And with a little help from Fide officials he is seriously back in title contention. Next month he will be favourite in his home city Sofia to defeat Gata Kamsky of the US and so qualify as Anand's official challenger.

Topalov's new surge has been technically interesting in two respects. He has won several key games by pre-analysed positional sacrifices of rook for bishop, brilliantly judging that the minor piece was better in the specific position. And he again confirmed that he is the supreme exponent of the white side of the Exchange Grunfeld 4 cxd5. Both themes appear below in his fastest win at the recent super-GM event in China. Topalov's 13 h3 is new but the real idea is the exchange sac 19 Rb5! Black is forced to take but has an array of weak pawns and 26...Bf6? proves fatal. At the end the five-time Russian champion Svidler resigns since his weak b6 and e6 pawns will fall, giving Topalov's passed pawns a free run to queen.

V Topalov v P Svidler

1 d4 Nf6 2 c4 g6 3 Nc3 d5 4 cxd5 Nxd5 5 e4 Nxc3 6 bxc3 Bg7 7 Bc4 c5 8 Ne2 Nc6 9 Be3 O-O 10 O-O Bd7 11 Rb1 Qc7 12 Bd3 Rfd8 13 h3 Be8 14 d5 Ne5 15 c4 e6 16 Nf4 Rab8 17 Be2 Rd6 18 Qc2 Ra6 19 Rb5! Bf8 20 a4 Bxb5 21 cxb5 Rd6 22 Qc3 Bg7 23 Qxc5 Rc8 24 Qxa7 b6 25 Qxc7 Rxc7 26 Rd1 Bf6 27 dxe6 Rxd1+ 28 Bxd1 fxe6 29 Bb3 1-0

Source: The Guardian, Saturday 3 January 2009