Sasikiran Lets Kramnik Slip With A Draw

By Arvind Aaron

India have been missing its chances against the Russians. Yesterday it was a win in the Women's Olympiad. On Nov 16, it was the fourth round of the Men's or Open Olympiad. A win for Krishnan Sasikiran against former World champion Vladimir Kramnik would have given India atleast a 2-2 draw. He drew the match by repetition in a slightly better position and we lost 1.5-2.5.

The move Sasikiran perhaps missed spotting was 29...Qd5 aiming to offer a discovered check as well as attacking the pawn on b3. White's attack is not serious and there was nothing for Kramnik. Earlier, Kramnik offered a pawn sacrifice to clamp down the black king side but the Chennai player extricated himself from the mess. The game was drawn in 35 moves.

The bright spot of India's 1.5-2.5 defeat to Russia was Harikrishna's first victory in this Olympiad which was over Peter Svidler on the second board. A side variation against the Grunfeld defence helped. In the final position, Svidler was faced with several threats like Bh6 mating or Rc7 winning the knight.

India lost the last two boards when Grischuk overcame Ganguly's Grunfeld and Morozevich proved that he was rated over 200 Elo than Chanda for his chess skills. Ganguly's ...e5 ceded Grischuk a passed pawn for good and he used that in good stead to win. Like in 2008, we scored 1.5-0.5 in the top two boards against Russia at Calvia 2004 too after Anand won (against Morozevich) and Sasikiran drew (Svidler) but the bottom let us down.

In the placings board, India is tied for the tenth place on six points. In the next round we face Austria. Russia and Germany-A are leading with full eight
points. They also face each other on Monday.

India Defeat Germany 3-1

India, seed eleven, continued to do well in the Women's Olympiad. They scored a healthy 3-1 win against the twelfth seed, Germany-A. The wins came from the black players for a chance, with Tania Sachdev and Mary Ann Gomes scoring over lower rated opponents. Harika and Swati Ghate drew while Nisha Mohota was naturally rested.

India moved to seven points from four rounds and have won three matches and drawn one. Now, we are going to be a feared team in this section as well. In the fifth round we face former champions Hungary with white on the top and third boards. China and Poland are leading the Olympiad with maximum eight points and face each other. For the third place, Russia, Georgia, India and Hungary are tied on seven points. Russia take on Georgia.

For details results and live games, you can visit http://dresden2008.de

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Home                                                 Published on 17^th November,  2008