Harika, Rohit near GM norms, Karthik finishes second in 'B' group

By  Vishal Sareen

Woman Grandmaster D Harika remained in line for her maiden Grandmaster norm after holding Grandmaster Jaan Ehlvest of United States in the 7th round of the 'A1' section of Aeroflot International chess festival at the Gamma-Delta hotel in Moscow.

It turned out to be a real bad day for Indian players in the premier group otherwise but Harika proved to be the lone saving grace as she held on to her own to force peace treaty with Ehlvest who played with white pieces.

Playing solidly right till the end Harika came up with yet another steller performance and now needs just one point out of the remaining two games to get a Grandmaster norm – a feat achieved by only two Indian women Humpy and Vijayalakshmi so far. Harika has 3.5 points, more than any other Indian in this section.

In the 'B' group the Indian contingent had something great to cheer about R Arun Karthik scored a hard fought victory over Grandmaster Bazar Hatanbaatar of Mongolia to tie for first place along with Vasif Durarbeyli of Azerbaijan. Both Karthik and Durarbeyli finished on an identical score of 7.5 points out of a possible 9 but the latter had a better tiebreak to be crowed the winner. Karthik also made his IM norm from the tournament. Also finishing well here was Suvrajit Saha who finished fifth.

Surprisingly all the other Indian players, barring Harika, in the big event 'A1' suffered defeats. Second seed Krishnan Sasikiran continued to struggle with his form and blundered away a better position against Igor Kurnosov of Russia, P Harikrishna mishandled a decent position to go down to Dmitry Svetushkin of Moldova and Israeli Ilia Smirin's endgame technique proved superior than national champion Surya Shekhar Ganguly. All the three Indians remained on 3 points after the defeats.

If this was not enough, more bad news awaited the Indians on the lower boards as S Vijayalakshmi was outdone by Tatiana Kosintseva of Russia while Parimarjan Negi could not convert a winning position and went down to Denis Khismatullin, also from Russia. Chances of Harikrishna and Sasikrian finishing amongst the prize winners nearly evaporated after the 7th round and both Indians will now have to play to control the damage done to their higher Elo
ratings. With just two rounds to come in the biggest open of the world, Russian trio of Evgeny Tomashevsky, Evgeny Alekseev and Dmitry Jakovenko share the lead on 5.5 points.

In the 'A2' section, G Rohit increased chances for second Grandmaster norm after defeating Grandmaster Sergei Iskusnyh of Russia in a tense game. Rohit moved to 4.5 points in this section and if he meets the right opposition in the remaining two rounds, the Indian needs 1.5 points to register the norm.

Grandmaster Abhijit Kunte is also moved to 4.5 points in this section after settling for a draw with Aleksandr Rakhmanov of Russia. The lead here is held by Grandmaster Safin Shukhrat of Uzbekistan who has amassed 6.5 points thus far and looks set to win the first prize of USD 12000.

Important and Indian results round 7 A1: Evgeny Alekseev (Rus, 5.5) beat Stanislav Novikov (Rus, 5); Evgeny Tomashevsky (Rus, 5.5) beat Artashes Minasian (Arm, 4.5); Dmitry Jakovenko (Rus, 5.5) beat Vladimir Akopian (Arm, 4); Krishnan Sasikiran (3) lost to Igor Kurnosov (Rus, 4); Dmitry Svetushkin (Mda, 4) beat P Harikrishna (3); Ilia Smirin (Isr, 4) beat Surya Shekhar Ganguly (3); Jaan Ehlvest (Usa, 3.5) drew with D Harika (3.5); S Vijayalakshmi (1.5) lost to Tatiana Kosintseva (Rus, 2); Parimarjan Negi (1) lost to Denis Khismatullin (Rus, 1.5).

A2: Safin Shukhrat (Uzb, 6.5) beat Alexandre Danin (Rus, 5.5); Marat Askarov (Rus, 6) beat Wang Rui (Chn, 5); Abhijit Kunte (4.5) drew with Aleksandr Rakhmanov (Rus, 4.5); G Rohit (4.5) beat Sergei Iskusnyh (Rus, 3.5); Deepan Chakkravarthy (4) beat Vasily Papin (Rus, 3); Alisa Galliamova (Rus, 4) beat S Meenakshi (3); G N Gopal (4) beat Zhao Xue (Chn, 3); Deep Sengupta (2) lost to Maxim Sorokin (Rus, 2); Ashwin Jayaram (2) lost to Valentin Iotov (Bul, 3); Kirill Kuderinov (Kaz, 1.5) lost to Tania Sachdev (2.5); S Arun Prasad (2) drew with Alexey Paveliev (Rus, 2); Lanka Ravi (1) lost to Elena Tairova (Rus, 1).

Reports :  Report  one  Report  Two  Report  Three  Report Four  Report  Five  Report Six

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Published on : 22nd Feb, 2007