Background
In the face of criticism of the knockout FIDE World Chess Championships held from 1998 to 2004, FIDE (the World Chess Federation) made changes for its World Chess Championship in 2005. It used normal (slow) time controls (unlike the 2002 and 2004 knockout tournaments), and changed the format to an eight-player, double round-robin event, where every player plays every other player twice, once with each colour.
The players invited were:
- The finalists from the previous (2004) FIDE World Championship: Rustam Kasimdzhanov and Michael Adams;
- Classical World Champion Vladimir Kramnik, and his most recent challenger, Péter Lékó;
- The next four top-rated players: Garry Kasparov, Viswanathan Anand, Veselin Topalov and Alexander Morozevich.
- Kramnik refused to play (see Aftermath section below), as did the recently retired Kasparov. Their places were taken by the next two players on the FIDE rating list: Peter Svidler and Judit Polgár.
The participation of Judit Polgár made her the first woman to compete for the world chess championship.
The opening ceremony took place on September 27, the matches started on September 28, and the closing ceremony took place on October 16.
Read more about this topic: FIDE World Chess Championship 2005
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