Jobava Wins, Norms Galore for Indians

GM Baadur Jobava. [Photo: AD Chess Festival]

Report by IA Praful Zaveri

Baadur Jobava, the elite Grandmaster from Georgia was back in the winning ways by annexing the 26th Abu Dhabi Masters Chess Championship with a stunning 8/9 and putting the field way behind him.

Starting as a rank outsider with 26th seeding, Jobava’s display left the ratings go haywire with 7 wins and 2 draws. The win fetched Jobava US $ 13000 purse and a hefty gain of 32 ELO to put him back in the 2600+ club and his march towards 2700+

A critical 8th round game for Jobava.

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17-year GM Yakubboev Nodirbek from Uzbekistan came into the spot light by securing a clear 2nd place with a score of 7/9. He lucky win against Indian GM Karthikeyan in the penultimate round steered him to the top of the table.

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The tournament witnessed a tie for 3-10 place between 7 players, with World Junior Chess Champion, Parham Maghsoodloo edging out the field on a better tie-break. The prize winners from 4-10 were GM Socko Bartosz, GM Indjic Aleksander, GM Saleh Saleh from host UAE, GM Petrosyan Manuel, GM Bartel Mateusz, GM Ni Hua and GM Tabatabaei Amin.

The best performance amongst Indians was registered GM Aryan Chopra, who secured 11th place while the four Indian Grandmasters, Karthikeyan (13), Deep Sengupta (14), Aravind Chithambaram (19) & Vaibhav Suri (20) finished in top 20.

The Indian contingent scored norms galore in this event: Rathanvel, Raahil Mullick, Aronyak Ghosh, Nitish Belurkar, Senthil Maran, Mahalakshmi scored IM norms while P Nandhidhaa & Tarini Goyal earned WGM & WIM norm respectively.

The event was concluded with a glittering prize distribution ceremony by the Abu Dhabi Chess & Culture Club.

Final Ranking after 9 Rounds

Rk.	SNo			Name	FED	Rtg	Pts.	TB1	TB2	TB3
1	26		GM	Jobava Baadur	GEO	2584	8,0	0,0	2591	54,5
2	28		GM	Yakubboev Nodirbek	UZB	2574	7,0	0,0	2591	52,0
3	4		GM	Maghsoodloo Parham	IRI	2656	6,5	0,0	2586	54,5
4	10		GM	Socko Bartosz	POL	2625	6,5	0,0	2573	51,0
5	11		GM	Indjic Aleksandar	SRB	2617	6,5	0,0	2565	52,0
6	3		GM	Salem A.R. Saleh	UAE	2668	6,5	0,0	2562	52,5
7	23		GM	Petrosyan Manuel	ARM	2592	6,5	0,0	2561	51,0
8	13		GM	Bartel Mateusz	POL	2612	6,5	0,0	2543	52,5
9	2		GM	Ni Hua	CHN	2668	6,5	0,0	2541	52,5
10	17		GM	Tabatabaei M.Amin	IRI	2601	6,5	0,0	2531	46,0
11	36		GM	Aryan Chopra	IND	2553	6,0	0,0	2554	45,5
12	16		GM	Zubov Alexander	UKR	2607	6,0	0,0	2551	47,0
13	14		GM	Karthikeyan Murali	IND	2612	6,0	0,0	2549	48,5
14	37		GM	Sengupta Deep	IND	2546	6,0	0,0	2537	47,5
15	22		GM	Can Emre	TUR	2593	6,0	0,0	2536	47,5
16	21		GM	Abdusattorov Nodirbek	UZB	2594	6,0	0,0	2532	47,5
17	9		GM	Esipenko Andrey	RUS	2625	6,0	0,0	2527	48,0
18	25		GM	Santos Latasa Jaime	ESP	2586	6,0	0,0	2526	45,5
19	15		GM	Aravindh Chithambaram Vr.	IND	2607	6,0	0,0	2513	48,0
20	24		GM	Vaibhav Suri	IND	2591	6,0	0,0	2466	46,5