Delhi International Open: Debashis, Mosadeghpour stay ahead; Dhanush Raghav wins Category ‘B’

Draws on eighth of the top nine boards saw Debashis Das and Iran’s Masoud Mosadeghpour maintain their half-point lead after six rounds of the Delhi International Open chess tournament

Tamil Nadu's N. S. Dhanush Raghav, winner of Category 'B' is flanked by runner-up, MP's Prakash Yadav (left) and Maharashtra's Prem Yadav.

Draws on eighth of the top nine boards saw Debashis Das and Iran’s Masoud Mosadeghpour maintain their half-point lead after six rounds of the Delhi International Open chess tournament here on Saturday. The 20-move draw between the leaders broke their sequence of five straight victories and raised their tally to 5.5 points. With four rounds to go, 16 players follow the leaders at five points. In fact, short draws was the order of the day at the leading boards. Though the top six boards ended with honours even, favourite Farrukh Amonatov scored over young GM-norm holder Srijit Paul on the seventh board to move to joint second spot. Another former champion Abhijeet Gupta followed suit by stopping Saravana Krishna. Youngsters E. Arjun, N. R. Visakh, his brother Vignesh were among those who emerged victorious. Meanwhile, Tamil Nadu’s N. S. Dhanush Raghav won the Category ‘B’ and walked away with the winner’s share of Rs. 3 lakh and a glittering trophy for his tally of nine points from 10 rounds. Madhya Pradesh’s Prakash Yadav, who also tallied nine points, was adjudged runner-up owing to inferior tie-break score. He received Rs. 2.51 lakh and a trophy. Maharashtra’s Prem Yadav topped a four-way tie at 8.5 to claim Rs. two lakh and a trophy. Category ‘C’ opens on Sunday with around 1500 entries for the 10-round event.

Important results (Indians unless stated)Sixth round: Masoud Mosadeghpour (Iri, 5.5) drew with Debashis Das (5.5); Deepan Chakkravarthy (5) drew with Ivan Popov (Rus,5); Kirill Stupak (Blr, 5) drew with Aleksej Aleksandrov (Blr, 5); Tran Tuan Minh (Vie, 5) drew with S. L. Narayanan (5); Diptayan Ghosh (5) drew with D. Gukesh (5); Levan Pantasulaia (Geo, 4.5) drew with Ehsan Ghaem Maghami (Iri, 5). Fifth round: Maghami drew with Ghosh; Neelash Saha lost to Debashis; Alexandr Predke (Rus) lost to Mosadeghpour; Ziaur Rahman (Ban) drew with Farrukh Amonatov (Tjk); N. R. Vignesh (4) drew with Ivan Rozum (4).