Niranjan Navalgund makes Grandmaster norm

AICF Office 8 years ago

Untitled Niranjan Navalgund made his maiden Grandmaster norm despite losing to Grandmaster Dzhumaev Marat of Uzbekistan in the ninth and penultimate round of 15^th Parsvnath International chess tournament now underway here.

Having secured 6.5 points against high ranking opposition in the first eight rounds, Navalgund only had to turn up to play his game in the ninth round and despite the loss his performance thus far was good enough for a grandmaster norm. Being untitled, Navalgund has set a new benchmark for youngsters and the Chennai-based author looks good to be a Grandmaster in quick time.

Meanwhile Grandmaster Farrukh Amanotov of Tajikistan stayed ahead of the field with a quick draw against Swayams Mishra. With 8 points in his kitty, Amanotov remains the sole leader and is now trailed by Diptayan Ghosh and Dzhmaev who both are a half point behind.

The Rs. 18 Lakh tournament will come to an end on Monday and it seems Amanotov is the hot favourite at this point. However as the last round pairings suggest Diptayan Ghosh has a task on hand if he can win against the top ranked player here.

Local hopeful Sahaj Grover has a chance to finish in top ten if he can win his last round game against Saptarshi Roy. However the Bengal International Master is in top form here.

Marat Dzhumaev has been in best form in the last few games and all eyes will be on him in the last round too. His uncompromising style calls for a scintillating finish to this year’s event.

For the next year, the prize money bar has been raised to over Rs. 77 lakhs. The Delhi International is the highest attended event in the country with participation of over 2000 players.

GM	Amonatov Farrukh	7½	½ – ½	6½	IM	Swayams Mishra
GM	Ghosh Diptayan	6½	1 – 0	6½	IM	Saptarshi Roy
IM	Visakh N R	6½	½ – ½	6½	GM	Karthikeyan Murali
	Navalgund Niranjan	6½	0 – 1	6½	GM	Dzhumaev Marat
GM	Lalith Babu M R	6	½ – ½	6	GM	Deviatkin Andrei
GM	Tukhaev Adam	6	1 – 0	6	GM	Sunilduth Lyna Narayanan
GM	Nguyen Huynh Minh Huy	6	½ – ½	6	GM	Sivuk Vitaly
	Aradhya Garg	6	0 – 1	5½	GM	Movsziszian Karen
GM	David Alberto	5½	½ – ½	5½	FM	Thakur Akash
IM	Ravi Teja S.	5½	½ – ½	5½	GM	Horvath Adam
GM	Czebe Attila	5½	1 – 0	5½		Shashikant Kutwal
GM	Roy Chowdhury Saptarshi	5½	½ – ½	5½	GM	Neverov Valeriy
GM	Grover Sahaj	5½	1 – 0	5½		Gireman Ja
IM	Kathmale Sameer	5½	½ – ½	5½	GM	Neelotpal Das
	Pranav Shetty	5½	0 – 1	5½	IM	Shyaamnikhil P
GM	Murshed Niaz	5½	1 – 0	5½	IM	Sangma Rahul
GM	Hesham Abdelrahman	5½	1 – 0	5½		Masango Spencer
	Sammed Jaykumar Shete	5½	½ – ½	5½	IM	Vignesh N R
GM	Bernadskiy Vitaliy	5	1 – 0	5½		Dodeja Pawan
GM	Malakhatko Vadim	5	0 – 1	5	IM	Murali Krishnan B T