Anand picks Carlsen to be his second

You scratch my back and I'll scratch yours. If you've been playing Farmville lately at Facebook, you know what we mean. Current world champ Viswanathan Anand picks Norwegian prodigy and future world champion himself, Magnus Carlsen to be by his side as one of his seconds in his upcoming 2010 World Championship match with challenger Vaselin Topalov of Bulgaria. Here's a report from chessdom which first brought to our attention and over here at telegraphindia.com where the source of the interview with Anand first published.

Of course, Carlsen, being an employee to his future boss will be paid a considerable sum but by actually teaming up and working with one of the greatest chess player to ever played the game and hence the experience and learning he would need to guide him through his own ambition of becoming a world champion in the not so distant future is priceless. In fact, with Anand's current status with Carlsen, Anand is also poised to become one of Carlsen's future second when his time finally comes to challenge for the throne. It maybe more of a personal benefit than mutual friendship I should say, not your usual Kramnik-Leko tandem, but anyway it's a serious team Anand is building up there.