The loss with white pieces proved quite costly for Anand as he slipped to joint sixth in the standings in the eight-player round robin tournament. The Indian will now be under pressure to score in the remaining three games to come back to a par score.
Riding high on his success against Carlsen in round three, Arkadij Naiditsch of Germany emerged as the sole leader defeating compatriot David Baramidze. Naiditsch took his tally to a very impressive three points out of a possible four and is now trailed by Carlsen and Fabiano Caruana of Italy on 2.5 points apiece.
About three weeks before Carlsen played the Dutch defense as black and lost to Anand's long-time second Radoslav Wojtazek of Poland in the Tata Steel tournament. While that was the Leningrad variation, the world champion decided to try out the Stonewall set-up this time to ensure a lively game.
Anand was not out of the game, but the pressure proved disastrous for the Indian when on the 32nd move he simply blundered and walked in to a lost position. Instead, there was still a defensive resource that escaped Anand's attention. The game lasted 36 moves.