Sasikiran suffers setback

By Arvind Aaron

COLOMBO, MAY 8. Top seed and overnight leader Krishnan Sasikiran suffered a setback as lead changed hands at the end of an eventful fifth round in the men's section of the FIDE World chess championship zonal tournament being played here at Hotel Airport Garden on Tuesday.

At the end of round five this evening, Grandmaster Dibyendu Barua, who shocked Sasikiran, is one of the three players in lead with four points from five games. The other two are Surya Sekhar Ganguly, his Kolkata team-mate, and Abu Sufain Shakil of Bangladesh. In the second spot are the top two seeds Sasikiran and Abhijit Kunte with 3.5 points.

The Indian women had a roaring day, winning all but one game. In that lone game, leader International Woman Master Pallavi Shah ran into difficulty but claimed and got a draw in an opposite colour bishop ending against seasoned veteran Rani Hamid of Bangladesh.

Pallavi Shah continues to lead the women's section with 3.5 points after four rounds. Her lead was narrowed as Meenakshi, Vijayalakshmi and Swati Ghate won easily to reach three points.

Five rounds remain in this section.

Pallavi Shah started wonderfully well with the black pieces. She played perfectly with her pieces occupying ideal natural squares in the Sicilian Najdorf opening. In the time control, she started to loosen her grip and when the queens were exchanged off, Hamid started to have an upper hand. In an opposite colour bishop ending, both players had less than five minutes when the arbiter accepted Pallavi's claim for a draw.

After accepting her claim when it came down to the last pawn and bishop, the arbiters adviced Pallavi not to claim as often as she did in future games. Pallavi who was convinced that Rani Hamid was only trying to win the game on the clock like she did two days back against Saheli Barua, felt the arbiters should have accepted her earlier claim and they did not know enough chess.

Meenakshi recovered from Sunday's third round defeat to rebound at the cost of Upasena Hasini in round four. She checkmated the Sri Lankan girl on move 37 with the white pieces in a king's Indian defence opening.

Top seed Vijayalakshmi spotted a knight sacrifice that won her two pawns on move 10 to register an easy victory over Tanima Parveen. The final blow came on the 22nd move when Vijayalakshmi, India's strongest woman player ever planted a bishop to win a rook via a pin. Tanima resigned having played poorly with the white pieces against the Pirc defence. Both players did not castle.

Like Vijayalakshmi, Swati Ghate also had an easy time, winning against Anupama Konara with a decisive king side attack against the French defence in 22 moves.

Saheli Barua who was sick last night and had an appointment with a doctor recovered well to defeat Vineetha Wijesuriya with a double pawn sacrifice. She took advantage of black's undeveloped position in a Caro-Kann opening to snare the black queen and win a knight. With this victory, all five Indian women are occupying the top five places.

The day's action was cornered by the experienced Barua who beat Sasikiran to give interest to the event. It set up a new leaders platform. Barua used a tiny mistake on move 20 by Sasikiran to win with a king side attack in 40 moves. Sasikiran resigned when he could not stop white's passed queen rook pawn in the minor piece ending.

In the Sicilian Scheveningen game, S. Krishnan, father-trainer of Sasikiran said black could play for advantage

with 20...Qb7 with the same idea which black used in the game to follow. Barua told The Hindu that black missed the mate on h7 and that turned the result. The players had delivered blows to each other and lively battles were normal and Tuesday's lived up to expectations. But the result was the same as in the Mumbai Zonals last year.

In the afternoon session, Barua (black) and Ganguly fought down till the wire before signing a 41-move draw from the Petroff's defence. They kept their lead but Abu Sufain Shakil joined them at the top of the standings. Six rounds remain to be played in the men's section.

Sasikiran who has a poor score against Kunte took a draw with white in 18 moves. The position evened out and the Nimzo-Indian defence offered no real chances to either side. Kunte drew his morning session as well against his room-mate Prasad in 34 moves with the white pieces from a Giuoco Piano opening.

Ganguly who is preparing hard for his games even beyond midnight had a good day, first in his tactical 24-move victory over Enamul Hossain and then with his solid draw against Barua.

The hero of the second session was Abu Sufain Shakil, the 22-year old second year B.Com student from Dhaka who surprisingly joined the lead humbling his third Sri Lankan opponent. He capitalised on a wrong sacrifice of Peiris to complete a sweep of his third Sri Lankan player. He has tough opponents on hand in the coming rounds.

After going without a win for the first four rounds, Devaki Prasad finally found his form with the white pieces when he defeated Amarawickrama in a queen ending that emerged from a Sicilian Rauser opening.

The results (fifth round):

Men: K.Sasikiran drew Abhijit Kunte, D.V.Prasad bt H.U.Amarawickrama, Taibur Rahman lost to Reefat Bin-Sattar, S.S.Ganguly drew D.Barua, T.D.R.Peiris lost to

Abu Sufain Shakil, L.Wijesuriya lost to Enamul Hossain.

Fourth round: Men: Abu Sufain Shakil bt Taibur Rahman, Reefat Bin-Sattar bt L.Wijesuriya, Enamul Hossain lost to S.S.Ganguly, D.Barua bt K.Sasikiran, A.Kunte drew D.V. Prasad, H.U.Amarawickrama lost to T.D.R.Peiris.

Women: Saheli Barua bt Vineetha Wijesuriya, Tanima Parveen lost to S.Vijayalakshmi, Swati Ghate bt Anupama Konara, S.Meenakshi bt Upasena Hasini, Rani Hamid drew Pallavi Shah.

The standings: Men: 1-3 D.Barua, S.S.Ganguly (both Ind), Abu Sufain Shakil (Ban) 4/5 each, 4-5 K.Sasikiran, A.Kunte (both Ind) 3.5 each, 6 Reefat Bin-Sattar 3, 7-8 D.V.Prasad (Ind), Enamul Hossain (Ban) 2.5 each, 9-10 Taibur Rahman (Ban), T.D.R.Peiris (Srl) 1.5 each, 11-12 H.U.Amarawickrama, L.Wijesuriya (both Srl) 0 each.

Women: 1 Pallavi Shah (Ind) 3.5/4, 2-4 Meenakshi Subbaraman, Swati Ghate, Vijayalakshmi Subbaraman (all Ind) 3 each, 5-6 Saheli Barua (Ind), Tanima Parveen (Ban) 2 each, 7-8 Rani Hamid (Ban), Vineetha Wijesuriya (Srl) 1.5 each, 9 Anupama Konara (Srl) 0.5, 10 Upasena Hasini (Srl) 0.

The moves:

GM D.Barua-GM K.Sasikiran, round four, Sicilian Scheveningen, B85: 1.e4 c5, 2.Nf3 d6, 3.d4 cxd4, 4.Nxd4 Nf6, 5.Nc3 e6, 6.Be2 a6, 7.f4 Be7, 8.0-0 Qc7, 9.Kh1 0-0, 10.Be3 Nc6, 11.a4 Re8, 12.Bd3 Nb4, 13.a5 Bd7, 14.Qf3 Bc6, 15.Qg3 Nxd3, 16.cxd3 Rac8, 17.f5 e5, 18.Nde2 Kh8, 19.Bg5 b5 20.b4 d5, 21.Bxf6 gxf6, 22.exd5 Bb7, 23.Qh4 Rg8, 24.Rf3 Qd7, 25.Ne4 Qxd5, 26.Nxf6 Rg7, 27.Rg3 Qxg2+, 28.Rxg2 Bxg2+, 29.Kg1 Rc6, 30.Rc1 Bxf6, 31.Qh6 Bg5, 32.Rxc6 Bxh6, 33.Rxh6 Be4+, 34.Ng3 Bxf5, 35.Rxa6 Bxd3, 36.Ra8+ Rg8, 37.Rxg8+ Kxg8, 38.a6 Bc4, 39.Ne4 Kg7, 40.Nc3 1-0.

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