Int’l Grandmasters Chess: Madhavan stuns Pavel

The Indian emerges the winner after 64 moves.

N. B. Hari Madhavan (right) has 5.5 points after seven rounds.

It was the turn of another Indian to shock a Grandmaster. N. B. Hari Madhavan outwitted second-seeded Pavel Smirnov of Russia in the seventh round of the Tetrasoft Hyderabad Marriott International Grandmasters chess championship here on Saturday.

At the end of seventh round, GM Tukhaev Adam, GM Mosadeghpour Masoud and IM Triapishko Alexandr emerged joint-leaders with six points each followed by eight players in the second place. On the sixth board, Pavel of Russia preferred the d4 Opening to which Madhavan replied with d5. Within a few moves, the game got converted into Stolz Variation of Semi Slav Defence in which the Indian emerged winner after 64 moves with clever moves to get the better of the experienced opponent.

ROUND FIVE REPORT

On the third board, GM P. Karthikeyan of ICF, opting for d4 Opening, suffered a 55-move loss against GM Masoud Mosadeghpour of Iran who replied with d5. Once the game transposed into Pseudo-Catalan Opening, the Indian seemed to have lost control and ended up a loser.

On fifth board, top-seed GM Boris Savchenko of Russia played Kings pawn to e4 against V. Pranav of Tamil Nadu, who replied with c5 converting into Sicilian Defence. But the Indian found the going tough to end a loser in 53 moves once it slipped into Chelyabinsk variation.

Important results - seventh round Khusenkhojaev Muhammad (Tajik) 6 drew with Adam Tukhaev (Ukr) 6;  Alexander Triapishko (Rus) 6 drew with K. Rathanakaran (5.5);  P. Karthikeyan 5 lost to Masoud Mosadeghpour (Iri) 6;  R. R. Laxman 5.5 drew with P. Bharat Kumar Reddy 5.5;  Boris Savchenko (Rus) 5.5 bt V. Pranav 5;  Pavel Smirnov (Rus) 4.5 lost to N.B. Hari Madhavan 5.5;  Rodrigo Vasquez Schroeder (Chile) 5.5 bt Ch. Sai Karthik 4.5; Kaustuv Kundu 5 drew with Al Muthaiah 5;  Utkal Ranjan Sahoo 5.5 bt R. Raja Rithvik 4.5;  Shantanu Bhambure 5 bt Pratik Patil 4.5;  Varshney Aaryan 4.5 drew with Akila Kavinda 4.5;  Kushagra Mohan 5 bt Giasuddin Ahmed (Bangla) 4;  G. Aditya Varun 4 lost to V. Varun 5;  Rajesh Nayak 4 lost to J.K. Raju 5;  J. Ramakrishna 4 lost to M. Mohammad Anees 5;  Ayush Ravikumar 4.5 drew with Vedant Pimpalkhare 4.5.