The top four finishers of the
2005 FIDE World Championship event were granted direct entry into the 2007 event. However,
Veselin Topalov,
FIDE World Chess Champion 2005, was replaced by
Vladimir Kramnik, Classical World Chess Champion, after losing his unification match to him in the
2006 World Championship. Four further players qualified through the 2005–07 qualification process, which consisted of three stages: • Continental championships • 2005 World Cup • 2007 Candidates Tournament
2005 World Cup The 2005 World Cup, held in
Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia, was the main qualification path for the Candidates tournament (providing 10 out of 16 candidates). It was a knock-out tournament of mini-matches, in the style of the
FIDE World Chess Championships 1998-2004. However, once 16 players were left, they were no longer immediately eliminated, but played further mini-matches to establish places 1 through 16. The top finishers were: • • • • • • • • The top 10 qualified for the Candidates Tournament. Since Bacrot was already qualified on rating, 11th placed Malakhov also qualified.
2007 Candidates tournament One place in the
Candidates Tournament was reserved for
2004 FIDE World Champion Kasimdzhanov, who had also finished 6th in the
2005 championship tournament. Five places were then awarded to the five
highest rated players (average of July 2004 and January 2005 ratings): Leko, Adams, Polgar, Shirov and Bacrot. The remaining ten places went to the highest finishers at the
2005 World Cup who had not otherwise qualified (see above). The Candidates tournament, held in
Elista,
Kalmykia, Russia, from 26 May to 14 June 2007, was originally to consist of a two-round
knockout with one player qualifying from each quarter of the draw. In September 2006, FIDE proposed that these players play a 16 player, single round-robin tournament instead. However this decision was reversed, and the tournament consisted of two rounds of matches as originally planned. World Cup winner Aronian was top seed, with the remaining players seeded in rating order according to the January 2006 ratings list. In the second round, the 1v16 winner played the 8v9 winner, 2v15 winner versus 7v10 winner, and so on.
Match conditions Matches were best of six games, at normal time controls (40/120, then 20/60, then 15 minutes + 30 seconds per move). Where matches were tied after six games, tie breaks were played on the seventh day: • Best of four rapid games were played. Rapid time control was 25 minutes for the game, plus 10 seconds per move. • Where the score was still tied, best of two blitz games were played. Blitz time control was 5 minutes for the game, plus 10 seconds per move. • If the score was still tied, the players would have drawn lots for a single sudden death game where White had six minutes but needed to win, Black had five minutes but only needed to
draw. This final stage of tie break, called an
Armageddon chess game, was never required.
Bracket The four second round winners qualified for the championship tournament. ==2007 Championship tournament==