Gelfand Challenge: Praggnanandhaa slips to second spot

R. Praggnanandhaa slipped to second place and required a strong finish over the last four rounds of the Gelfand Challenge online rapid chess tournament on Sunday.

Published : Jun 13, 2021 19:38 IST , New Delhi

File picture of R. Praggnanandhaa.
File picture of R. Praggnanandhaa.
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File picture of R. Praggnanandhaa.

R. Praggnanandhaa slipped to second place and required a strong finish over the last four rounds of the Gelfand Challenge online rapid chess tournament on Sunday.

Trailing by half-point to Germany’s Vincent Keymer (12 points), Praggnanandhaa was left to rue the costly oversight against Kazakh girl Zhansaya Abdumalik in the 12th round when reached a dominant position but lost his queen to a knight-fork and resigned. The other half-point he dropped on Friday was also to a Kazakh girl, Dinara Sadukassova in the final round.

READ: Praggnanandhaa wins five in a row, shares lead

In fact, it was Keymer’s final-round win over Zhansaya that gave him the sole lead.

Nihal Sarin, who needed to win all five rounds on Friday to have an outside chance of returning to the title-race, kept winning and caught up with D. Gukesh at the fourth spot.

Gukesh scored three points on Saturday and lost two, including one to Nihal. Leon Mendonca scored 3.5 points from four rounds before losing the day’s last round to third-placed Christopher Yoo (USA).

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