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Commonwealth
Chess Championship 2006
By
Mr.Praful Zaveri
GM Ganguly Shocked
The biggest casualty
of the LIC/ONGC/MTNL sponsored Commonwealth Chess Championship 2006, being
held at Eskay Resorts – Borivali, was the loss of 2nd seeded,
GM S.S. Ganguly at the hands of his state-mate and untitled, Arghadip Das.
Ganguly, playing Black, opted for the Sicilian defense against the e4
opening of white. However, Arghayadip Das was prepared better in this
variation and he soon got good space advantage, which allowed him to go
for exchange sacrifice on move 20. He recovered back the material and also
gained one pawn in the process. Ganguly helped him quickly to a win by
blundering his Queen on move 52..
The biggest excitement
however; was generated by the defending Champion and top-seeded Nigel
Short by opting the dangerous Evans Gambit against overnight leader
Abhijeet Gupta. The line is considered risky as white throws cautions to
the wind by sacrificing pawns early. Here, Nigel sacrificed two pawns to
launch the standard attack. Abhijeet proved equal to the task by giving
back one pawn to stay in the game. On move 17, better position of white
allowed him to sacrifice his Rook for a Bishop to gain two dangerous
central passers. Abhijeet surrendered on move 41 when faced with a loss of
heavy material.
On table three and 4,
GM Praveen Thipsay v/s IM Saptarshi Roy Chowdhury and Neelotpal Das v/s
Tejas Bakre was agreed draw without much risk.
On table 5, IM M.R.
Venkatesh, who had held Nigel to a draw in the last round, gave a
wonderful display of attacking chess to stop Praveen Kumar. While IM S.
Kidambi also halted the run of WGM D. Harika.
There is now a
four-way lead, which is shared by Nigel Short, Arghaydip Das, M.R.
Venkatesh and
S. Kidambi.
They are followed by a big group of nine players with four points.
The other notable
upsets of the day were the losses of IM Prathamesh Mokal against young
Srinath. WGM Swati Ghate and GM Wu Shaobin were held to a draw by their
young rivals, Priyadarshan and Nitin respectively.
Key Results of Round 5:
GM Nigel Short (4.5)
beat Abhijeet Gupta (4), Das Arghyadip (4.5) beat GM S S Ganguly (3.5), GM
Praveen Thipsay (4) drew IM Saptarshi Roy Chowdhury (4), GM Neelotpal Das
(4) drew GM Tejas Bakre (4), C Praveen Kumar (3.5) lost to IM M R
Venkatesh (4), IM S Kidambi (4.5) beat WGM Harika D (3.5), GM Sandipan
Chanda (4) beat P Karthikeyan (3), FM Sai Srinivas (3) lost to GM Deepan
Chakravarthy (4), S.P. Sethuraman (3.5) drew GM R.B. Ramesh (3.5), WGM
Eesha Karavade (3) lost to GM Dibyendu Barua (4), Akshayaj Kore (3.5) drew
WGM Nisha Mohota (3.5), Shashikant Kutwal (3) lost to IM Arun Prasad (4),
Tunveer Gilani (3) lost to G.N. Gopal (4), IM Sudhakar Babu (4) beat G
Rohit (3), IM Himanshu Sharma (3.5) drew Akshat Khamaparia (3.5), FM K.
Priyadarshan (3.5) drew WGM Swati Ghate (3.5), Sai Meera (3.5) drew IM
Chandrasekhar Gokhale (3), WGM S Meenakshi (3) beat R. Weerawardene (Sri
Lanka) (3), FM Narayanan Srinath beat (3) IM Prathamesh Mokal (3),
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Published on 27.11.2006
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