Iwasa National Women Premier Final: Padmini Rout wins crown for the 4th time

(L) Sakshi unable to hold Padmini Rout (R)

Report by I.A Vijayaraghavan V

IM Padmini Rout – Mission Possible IV

IM Padmini Rout of PSPB successfully defended her title in the IWASA 44th National Women Premier Chess Championship here at the Surat Tennis Club. She scored 7.5 points out of 11 rounds followed by Bhakti Kulkarni of Air India, Mary Ann Gomes of PSPB & Soumya Swaminathan of PSPB all on 7 points.

Padmini won her game against Sakshi and waited for other results. When Soumya was held by Bala Kannamma, the onus was on Bhakti who had better Sonneborn Berger scores than Padmini. But Bhakti could only muster a draw and it was once again Padmini the winner.

The king’s Indian attack by Padmini was well held by Sakshi only to mess up in the endgame were former rooks invasion was quite threatening. The game ended in 59 moves when black was to lose the third pawn and nothing to show up.

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Bhakti’s advantage against Samriddha Ghosh from the black side of closed Guico piano petered out into a drawn minor piece ending after a battle of 75 moves. Had Bhakti won this game she would have been the champion.

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Mary Ann Gomes of PSPB mobilized her major pieces around Nandhidhaa’ss king to score a point in 40 moves. In a Modern defense game, Mary decided to throw her pieces against white and succeeded, though Nandhidhaa could have defended better.

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Srishti was placed at the bottom of the table, but her wins against Nandhidhaa in the penultimate round and Meenakshi in the last round cannot be taken lighter.The girl from Maharashtra defending the queen pawn game equalised early and even won a pawn in the 21st move. The endgame part was well played by Srishti who won the game in 41 moves. Meenakshi’s nerve has failed her with 2 losses in the last rounds, despite tie-breaks favouring her.

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Swati Ghate drew here LIC teammate Kiran Manisha in 61 moves after missing a winning tactic 28.Rxd5 due to time pressure. Two of Swati’s queenside passed pawns failed to make to 8th rank and Kiran sacrificed a knight to retreat the king to wrong corner and draw was on cards.

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Final Ranking after 11 Rounds