That's true. My comment was premised on the assumption that we want to retain a World Champion title. And there is definitely a whole new element that comes int

That's true. My comment was premised on the assumption that we want to retain a World Champion title. And there is definitely a whole new element that comes into play with matches. If we still want to stick to the tradition of a world championship match, perhaps the best way to do it is to have a double round robin of the top 10 players, and the top two finishers then play a match for the title of World Champion. Your comment about rewarding consistent but rarely brilliant versus uneven but great bring up another interesting nuance about matches versus tournaments. Fischer complained that once a player gets ahead in a match, there is no motivation to play fighting chess because every half point bring him closer to winning a match, and players are therefore incentivized to play for a draw. In a tournament, that usually isn't the case since the leader will typically have a few players nipping at his heels.