If the Norwegians are right about 2857, then this is even the highest live rating by 0.4 (but maybe they were rounding down from a slightly higher number). Still here's hoping for 2858 to settle the matter.

I don't wanna strengthen the hype but is there really a reason to think that Carlsen is on form/playing at his best right now ?

+1, very interesting (and quite gutsy, I must say) Qsac that will, unfortunately, be overshadowed by the game´s result (and especially today - by the Elo hysteria...).

Hopefully Gawain will learn to combine accuracy + better time management (is that some kind of disease amongst the young Brits?) with his Sutovskian ideas, to (at least) reach 2700+ someday.

That's a major reason MC is #1,

Of course Carlsen wouldn't say that the queen sacrifice was plain bad or just a hallucination - it would be rude towards the opponent AND it would de-mystify his own play. The way the game went, it took a few consolidating moves from Carlsen to neutralize the black initiative and emerge winning. Even if the sacrifice was correct (I doubt it) it has to be followed up with correct play, else things are easy for the opponent.

I was also a bit puzzled about the one-sentence game summary mentioning Carlsen's fourth move (initially also 5.h3) but not Jones' 18th move - which decided the game and wasn't a logical outcome of the opening. I am sure that Peter Doggers looked at the entire game rather than just the opening and the final result, and most likely he agrees that the queen sacrifice wasn't necessary or desperate (everything else is also bad), but that wasn't clear from the "More later" version of this article.

English players have quite a tactical imagination as Nigel Short demonstrated through several brilliant moves during his match with Kasparov.

Magnus won his game , that's all there is to say

Wasn't Kasparov rated 2849 when he lost the WCh match to Kramnik, rated 2770 at the time? 2000 A.D.

Despite his huge Elo rating advantage the "Rating Kween" had to hand over the bay leave--Laurus nobilis.

Sorry fella's, don't mean to blow those inflated Elo bubbles but, the rating game is just given too much credit, too much air-time.

For Karpov it wasn't about rating but about winning the title and tournaments. He'd be content and relax with 0,5 points more than number 2.

Does this rating gap correspond to a great score against the top 5 or does it merely reflect a better score against lesser players ?
Since we are comparing Kasparov's record it should be noted that Kasparov destroyed every top player convincingly except for Kramnik who was 2/3rd in rating at the time with an equal score.

...this was probably his home preparation developed for the WC match, he could not show, lol