Following yet another day of classic display, M. Karthikeyan maintained his winning sequence by scoring over second seed M. R. Lalith Babu and Russia’s Andrei Deviatkin after six rounds of the Delhi International Open chess tournament here on Thursday.
On a double-round day, Karthikeyan nailed Babu, the second seed, and followed it up with the conquest of Deviatkin after the Russia’s idea of giving up his rook for a bishop and pawn on the 20th move eventually backfired in 63 moves.
Following Karthikeyan, the leader with six points, were top seed Farrukh Amonatov and young N. R. Visakh at 5.5 points. Amonatov, held by Vietnamese Nguyen Huynh Minh Huy in the morning, got the better of Sahaj Grover in 30 moves while Visakh, seeded 21, upstaged 14th seeded Hungarian Attila Czebe in 37 moves.
Niranjan Navalgund continued to make steady progressed and reached five points after holding 17th seeded Ukrainian Valeriy Neverov.
Chittal crowned Group 'B' champion
Meanwhile, in Group ‘B’, Maharashtra’s Sairaj Chittal emerged as champion after scoring nine points from 10 rounds. He ensured the first prize of Rs. two lakh, ahead of Gujarat’s Udit Kamdar and Odisha’s Sradhanjali Jena (8.5 each).
Udit and Sradhanjali were richer by Rs. 1.5 lakh and one lakh, respectively. The ‘C’ category begins on Friday with over 1000 players.
The results (Indians unless stated):
Sixth round: M. Karthikeyan (6) bt Andrei Deviatkin (Rus, 4.5); Farrukh Amontaov (Tjk, 5.5) bt Sahaj Grover (4.5); N. R. Visakh (5.5) bt Atila Czebe (Hun, 4.5); Swayams Mishra (5) drew with Nguyen Huynh Minh Huy (Vie, 5); Valeriy Neverov (Ukr, 5) drew with Niranjan Navalgund (5); Diptayan Ghosh (5) bt R. K. Srihari (4); Saptarshi Roy (4.5) drew with S. L. Narayanan (4.5); Arystanbek Urazayev (Kaz, 4) lost to Vitaly Sivuk (Ukr, 5); Adam Horvath (Hun, 5) bt Rakesh Kulkarni (4); S. Ravi Teja (4.5) drew with Marat Dzhumaev (Uzb, 4.5); S. Nitin (5) bt Ankit Gajwa (4); Adam Tukhaev (Ukr, 4.5) bt Akash Iyer (4).
Fifth round: Huy drew with Amonatov; Babu lost to Karthikeyan; Narayanan drew with Nitin; Sivuk drew with Teja; Deviatkin bt Sayantan Das; Czebe bt Rahul Sangma; P. Iniyan lost to Swayams Mishra; Hamed Nouri (Phi); Grover bt Akash Thakur; Saptarshi Roy Choudhury lost to N. R. Visakh.
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