Gurgaon Grandmasters Chess: Close finish ahead

Gurgaon: With two round remaining the 2nd edition of Gurgaon International Grandmasters Chess Tournament heading for a close finish as at the end of eighth round matches seven players including top seed Kravtsiv Martyn of Ukraine and Indian hope Sahaj Grover leading the point table with six and half points.

In the eighth round, most of the top board battles ended without decisive result. On top board Martyn signed the peace treaty with Grandmaster Tornike Sanikidze of Georgia while Russian Grandmaster Evdokimov Alexander and Grover settled for half point against lost round hero International Master Prasanna Rao and second seed Oliver Barbosa of Philipppines respectively. These results helped International Masters Vikramaditya Kulkarni and Swayams Mishra to catch up with overnight leaders pack as they outwitted Grandmaster S Kidamabi and International Master Shivananda B S in the eighth round encounters. A pack of fifteen players including Barbosa are now sharing the joint second spot with six points.

Before the start of penultimate round which is in progress at the time of report, Shri. Rao Indrajit, Member of Parliament visited the tournament hall and interacted with players and inaugurated the ninth round proceedings by making the move against top seed Kravtsiv Martyn in presence of Shri. Naresh Sharma, General Secretary of the Haryana Chess Association, Shri. Anil Kumar Parnami, Vice President the Haryana Chess Assocaition, Shri. Rajpal Chauhan, Organising Secretary and Shri. Manuj Bhardwaj, Chairman I AM Change and Shri. G L Sharma, Senior Leader of Haryana Insaaf Manch.

During his address Shri. Rao assured that he will follow the matter of Financial Grant with the Govt. and if he can sanction grant from his discretionary quota he will do it. He congratulated the orgnaisers for holding an International event of such magnitude in Gurgoan.

The final round matches will start on Wednesday morning and closing ceremony scheduled at 4 pm IST.


Important Results (Indians otherwise stated) :-

Round - 8 :- GM Kravtsiv Maryn of UKR (6.5) drew with Tornike Sanikidze of GEO (6.5); GM Alexander Evdokimov of RUS (6.5) drew with IM Prasanna Rao (6.5); GM Oliver Barbosa of PHI (6) drew with GM Sahaj Grover (6.5); GM John Paul Gomez of PHI (6) drew with Kunal M (6); IM Karthikeyan P (6) drew with GM Eldar Gasanov of UKR (6): IM Shivananda B S (5.5) lost to IM Swayams Mishra (6.5); IM Shyam Nikil (6) drew with GM Raset Ziatdinov of USA (6); GM S Kidambi (5.5) lost to IM Vikramaditya Kulkarni (6.5); GM Merab Gagunashvili of GEO (5.5) drew with Karthik V (6.5); Akash PC Iyer (5.5) drew with GM Marat Dzhumaev of UZB (6): GM Valeriy Neverov of UKR (5) lost to Tillyaev Ulugbek of UZB (6); GM Arun Prasad (5.5) drew with Puneet Jaiswal (5.5); IM N Srinath (6) beat Aniruddha Deshpande (5); Surendran N (5.5) drew with IM Rajesh VAV (5.5); IM S Satyapragyan (5.5) drew with Lakshmi Narayanan M V (5.5); Ravi Teja S (6) beat Sattarov Bobir of UZB (5); Sameer Kathmale (6) beat WFM Sarvinoz Kurbonboeva of UZB (5); IM Nitin S (6) beat Nishant Malhotra (5); Deepthamsh Reddy M (6) beat Visakh N R (5); FM Akmal Faizulaev (6) beat Kumar Gaurav (5).