The leaders shared the point in a slightly odd Queen's Gambit Accepted. At the end Gelfand had two bishops against a pair of knights in a somewhat double-edged position, and both sides perhaps have winning chances. I presume that neither of them wanted to risk their good start in a risky time scramble.
Wang Yue against Ruslan Ponomariov was a rather dry affair with Black more-or-less equalizing and White flogging a dead horse for quite sometime before accepting the inevitable.
Here are some further details:
| White | Rating | Country | Result | Black | Rating | Country | No. Moves | Opening |
| Boris Gelfand | 2752 | ISR | 0.5-0.5 | Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu | 2672 | ROU | 32 | Queen's Gambit Accepted |
| Teimour Radjabov | 2740 | AZE | 0.5-0.5 | Magnus Carlsen | 2813 | NOR | 72 | Sicilian defence |
| Wang Yue | 2752 | CHN | 0.5-0.5 | Ruslan Ponomariov | 2733 | UKR | 40 | Catalan opening |
Radjabov tried 2.Nc3 and 3.Bb5 against the Sicilian but didn't obtain anything special out of the opening. A series of skirmishes led to a simplified pseudo-ending of 'Rook, Bishop and three pawns against Rook, Knight and three' where Carlsen's passed pawn gave him some chances but Radjabov held firm.
| Name | Country | Rating | Pre-tournament rating change | World Ranking | points |
| Boris Gelfand | ISR | 2741 | -9 | 11 | 1.5 |
| Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu | ROU | 2672 | +11 | 59 | 1.5 |
| Magnus Carlsen | NOR | 2813 | - | 1 | 1 |
| Ruslan Ponomariov | UKR | 2733 | -4 | 18 | 1 |
| Wang Yue | CHN | 2752 | +3 | 8 | 0.5 |
| Teimour Radjabov | AZE | 2740 | - | 13 | 0.5 |
The third round games can be followed tomorrow live at 1.30 pm (London), 2.30 pm (Paris) or 3.30 pm local time.
For this possibility and other information see the Official site
