Sandipan, Abhijeet held to draws

Wed, Aug 11 10 11:07 PM

From Our Ches Correspondent Chalkida (Greece), Aug 11 (PTI) Third seed Grandmaster Sandipan Chanda and Grandmaster Abhijeet Gupta were held to draws by Jovica Radovanovic of Serbia and Shadi Paridar of Iran respectively in the second round of the first Negroponte International open chess tournament here. It turned out to be a bad day for young GM norm holders Sahaj Grover and Vaibhav Suri who both lost against lower ranked opponents in contrasting fashion. Top rated Indian GM Surya Shekhar Ganguly, however, was a picture of confidence in outclassing Asian women''s champion Atousa Pourkashiyan of Iran in a one-sided affair. Amongst other Indians in the fray Vishnu Prasanna and M Shyam Sundar are now in the joint lead on 2 points after winning their second successive game in the tournament. These along with Ganguly and 37 others comprise the leaders'' pack. On a mixed day for the Indian contingent here, the GM title aspirations of D HArika also suffered a minor setback as she was held to a draw by Evaggelos Kostopoulos of Greece. Harika, who made her second GM norm in the just concluded Kavala International chess tournament will now have to score heavily in the next few rounds to be in contention for her final norm which will make her a Grandmaster. Playing black, Sandipan Chanda was in for a surprise against Radovanovic who played extremely solidly. The Serbian kept exchanging pieces at regular intervals and had no troubles at all in keeping Chanda''s forces at bay. The players arrived at a queen and minor piece endgame where the draw was a just result. It was a similar story for Abhijeet from the black side of an Alapin Sicilian against Paridar. The Indian GM tried for complications but simplification was the choice of Paridar who was never in any troubles. After regulation exchanges, the players reached a minor piece endgame which was completely equal. Ganguly won a nice attacking game against Pourkashiyan. The famous second of Anand went for a king side onslaught early in the Petroff defense and knocked down all black pawns on that side to force matters quite easily. Grover was outdone from a better position Filippos Kouvatsos of Greece while Vaibhav Suri misplayed a level position to go down to Georgios Tzintzios, also of Greece. Seven more rounds still remain in 25000 Euros prize money tournament. .

Source: Published>