SL Narayanan finishes Podium in the Abu Dhabi Blitz Championship

Report by WGM Swati Ghate

Tenth of August was an exciting day for players in Abu Dhabi as main tournament had free day and all players enjoyed playing Blitz championship.

Vladimir Fedoseev and Aravindh led till 8th round in the tournament but Fedoseev finished 1st with 9.5 points out of 11. Three players including Wang Hao and Aaravindh C. tied for the third place but it was Narayanan who had the better tie-break to get the Bronze Medal. Also, a fine performance with 8.5 points placed Padmini Rout on 8th position in the main prize list.

Blitz: Final Ranking

Rest day might have had a relaxing spell on the players. Continuing his good form, Aravindh drew in a recently popular line of Scotch variation played by GM Cheparinov (2718) in the fourth round. White lifted the rook to h3, a3 then to a7 and finally was forced to sacrifice on b7. In the ensuing queen and pawn ending game was drawn after 54 moves.

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On the 8th board, Debhashis Das of India was paired against Nigel Short of England who has announced his nomination for Fide President’s post. After some initial exchanged arising from Torre Attack it looked like Black has good initiative with bishop and distant passed pawn but with creative play on the kingside, carrying some threats with g4,g5 Short could manage to draw by timely sacrificing his rook.

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Not for the result but purely for point of new idea with great learning, we could mark the game played between Anand Nadar vs Pantsulaia Levan of Armenia. Though exchange sacrifice is very common in Benoni, the one done in this game with typical opening moves can be found in very few games. Chess engines shows plus for white but black has convenient play after exchange sacrifice.

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Soumya Swaminathan could not keep in cool against first seed Le Quang Liem and lost. In was a bad day for Indian senior girls as they could not score a point. Playing immediately after a good show Asian Nations Cup in all the formats like Rapid, Blitz tournament Padmini Rout went down today to higher seed GM Yuffa Daniiel (2570).

Iniyan P. drew with Parligram in a difficult ending resulted from Nimzo Indian Defence. Gukesh played a good game to draw against former premier national champion Karthikeyan Murali. In the end white had rook, knight and bishop for the queen but he could not find safe shelter for his king and game was drawn.

In another upset Abhijit Gupta lost to Nguyen Anh Koi in his core opening, Grunfeld Defence. Sammer Kathmale played an entertaining game sacrificing a piece for three pawns early in the opening. Ultimately he could only draw against Saduakassova Dinara from Kazakistan, a regular chess Olympiad player for that country.

The 5th round was played on the same day in the evening. Nihal Sarin drew against Cheparinov on the 8th board. Swapnil Dhopade played solid chess to hold GM Lupulescu Constantin with black pieces in exchange variation of Caro-Kann defence. It was Iniyan P who is part of official sub-junior team was the hero of the 5th Round. He beat GM Sjugirov Sanan of Armenia. After winning pawn in the Dutch defence, Iniyan displayed a good technique to wrap the game, scoring win.

As the tournament has reached half way, five players are leading in Abu Dhabi Open chess tournament with three rounds to go. In the important encounter local hero GM Salem Saleh won against Amin Baseem in Open Ruy Lopez on 4th board to join the leaders. Salem playing white showed good opening preparation combining technical play to beat last year’s Abu Dhabi Tournament champion.

Pairings/Results

Round 5 on 2018/08/11 at 6:00 PM

The Ministry of Youth Affairs & Sports Affairs is sponsoring the full expenditure of National Youth and Senior championships winners for this exposure trip.