You have some alternative histrory there Pradeep.
3/4 of results are simply wrong!

Congrats to Gelfand! He deserves his place in Candidates tournament. I have a feeling that Malakhov will beat Pono tomorrow.
It would be more fair that WC finalist also qualified for Candidates tournament instead of wild card holder.

It would be nice to see a reiteration of how one qualifies--especially from FIDE. Gelfand played some exciting chess too! That hat he wears in siberia must be hiding a huge chip ;)

Gelfand gets two days rest before the final as opposed to only one for his opponent. In this Casino Exhaustasthon format, that makes a big difference. Gelfand has played very shrewdly all along, taking short draws to pace himself. It probably shouldn't be allowed, but it's helped him. I think he's going to win it.

@guncha: why "would it be more fair that WC finalist also qualified for Candidates tournament"? In that case they do not even have to play the final...

@Mr. Caveman: since when is being smart something that should be forbidden?

With short draws banned this kind of event wouldn't produce exciting, but awful chess. Imagine two weeks of playing with virtually no rest days, facing every third day a different world-class GM. Short draws are the sole resource of relaxation in such tournaments.

Gelfand is truly #6 in the world.

@PP
Because wild card nominee will most likely be a 2700 player who has been eliminated earlier than a finalist.

Gelfand managed to beat 2 tactical wizards in Judith Polgar and Maxime V-L which is really something , especially the latter because he was in very good form lately , i believe he'd had won the world cup had he not met super GM Boris Gelfand , even Gelfand acknowledged it was his most difficult opponent in the main site interview , he scraped it through in the last rapid game after Maxime missed a win .

Boris has all my backing as a consequence , it's impressive that he still has some energy left since he's the oldest of the field and this tournament is a nerve torture for the players , very exhausting , Boris played well in the Tal Memorial , was even unlucky against Kramnik at some point and could have finished higher with a bit more luck , but especially , Gelfand is a modest gentleman and fair competitor , very experienced chess player with classical style , i like his opening repertoire as well , so i hope for him he wins the world cup , he deserves it and would make a worthy champion

@guncha: my point remains. If both finalists get the same reward in the end, why bother to play the final? A difference in money? Honour?

That wildcard player could be somebody even stronger than the winner here. I do not know by heart who is certain of qualifying at the moment (Fide has complicated things enough that most of us do not really know the whole process anymore), but there must be several very strong players that will not have qualified... for some reason. Maybe a very young but very strong player that is not playing long enough to have made it through the whole process of qualifying. I do not dislike the idea of a wildcard player. Although Fide probably will have some very strange way of misusing it...

Players who have already reached Candidates final:
1. Loser of Topalov/Anand
2. Kamsky
3. Aronian (GP winner)
4. Carlsen (rating)
5. Kramnik (rating)

If Gelfand wins WC he will be ranked 6th in the World which means that top 6 will be present.
Players from top 7 to top 20 are equal and those two remaining spots should be decided over the board and not by host nominee.

@PP(NL): Unless FIDE changes the rules again (which, given the past, isn't impossible but still rather unlikely), the following players are qualified:
100% certain: loser of Anand-Topalov, Kamsky (last World Cup winner who subsequently lost against Topalov), Aronian (1st of the Grand Prix)
99% certain: Carlsen and Kramnik (rating spots)
33% certain: Gelfand or Ponomariov or Malakhov (one of them will win the World Cup)
33% certain: Radjabov or Gashimov or Mamedyarov (Azeri wildcard nominee rated >2700) [in any case, someone who hasn't reached the World Cup final]
plus one remaining spot for the 2nd from the GP series

BTW, four years ago, ten players qualified from the World Cup for the candidates tournament (after round 4, the 16 remaining players all continued to play matches for places 1-16).

The World Cup is just a knockout with the top players absent, and much less significant than the Grand Prix series. Here Karjakin reached the semi but lost rating points and didn't have to play any top opponent apart from Gelfand (0-2). In the Grand Prix he had to play for example Aronian, Radjabov, Carlsen, Leko, Ivanchuk, Grischuk, Svidler, Gashimov, Wang Yue and Gelfand, more than once. It says more if you repeatedly can score good results against such opposition than if you can go +1 in 12 games against lower ranked opponents plus Gelfand. It makes sense to have two places go to the GP series that takes place over more than two years and doesn't have rapid/blitz as the knockout, that is just one event where luck of the draw and rapid blunders play a role.

You are correct gg , but on the other hand , a world cup is brutal , the format ( 2 games only + 4 rapid + blitz ) makes it possible for anyone to beat anyone on their day , it's not the comfortable atmosphere of elite tounaments where you gain points without winning and can relax in rest days , world cup is not for the faint hearted , it's about sudden death and high emotional stress .

Also half the players you quoted were playing in the world cup , and there is a possibility the other half wouldn't have done better than Ivanchuk , Grischuk , Svidler , Gashimov etc.. , perhaps not Carlsen on current form , but the others wouldn't have been guaranteed the final really

Yeah ok , you're point was a GP tournament results produce a more worthy winner because they have to triumph against higher elo opposition , i agree with this , but my point is that i don't think it's easier to win the world cup cause in term of fatigue , stress and intensity , i think it is higher than in a GP tournament

I'm excited to watch Malakhov vs Ponomariov tiebreak. I'm so intrigued by Malakhovs 100% tiebreak wins in this tournament and how it fairs against Ponomariov. If he still wins all games against Ponomariov then he must have some kind of computer chip hidden in his head. after all he's a scientist hehe.

The photo of Gelfand above reminds me of Rowan Atkinson in Johnny English! Wonderful to see his rise to the final

Knockout Performance
---------------
Some of the best performance in KO format

Anand
--------
1997-Winner
2000-Winner
2000-Winner(World cup)
2002-Winner(World cup)
2002-Semifinal

Ponomariov
-------------
2002-Winner
2005-Final(World cup)
2007-Quarterfinal(World cup)
2009-Final(World cup)

Gelfand
---------
1997-semifinal
2000-semifinal(World cup)
2002-Quarterfinal
2005-Quarterfinal(World cup)
2009-Final(World cup)

Shirov
-------
1997-Quarterfinal
1999-Quarterfinal
2000-Final
2002-Quarterfinal
2007-Final(World cup)

Adams
------
1997-Final
1999-semifinal
2000-semifinal
2004-Final
2007-Pre-quarterfinal(World cup)

Kasimdzhanov
-------------
2002-Final(World cup)
2004-Winner

Karjakin
---------
2007-semifinal(World cup)
2009-semifinal(World cup)

Malakhov
----------
2002-Quarterfinal(World cup)
2005-Pre-quarterfinal(World cup)
2009-semifinal(World cup)

Ok, the data is not wrong, but what a mess you made :)

Just because some event was called World Cup in the past, it doesn't mean you can mix those events with todays World Cups or former FIDE World Championships.

Earlier World Cups had group play and only then 3 rounds of KO which is incomparable with todays World Cup. Besides, What about ACP world cups then? Why didn't you include them too and other KO tournaments? And if you were looking at the events called "world cup" then what about those in 1980's?

If you want your data to have any meaning then better you stick with 7 rounds KO's, and these are FIDE World Championships: 1997/8, 1999, 2000, 2001/2, 2004, and World Cups 2005, 2007 and 2009.

You are just mixing apples and oranges.

kindly indicate the wrong data i have given....u must be new to chess