The Hindu : Sport / Chess : Kancheepuram `A' leads

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Feb 14, 2007
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Sport - Chess

Kancheepuram `A' leads

Arvind Aaron

Chennai: Fifth seed and defending champion, Kancheepuram `A', which scored a 4-0 victory over Mangalore `B' in the morning and then clawed back to hold Hyderabad 2-2, took the lead with 16 points (from 20 games) at the end of the fifth round in the 10th National Cities chess championship here on Tuesday.

Hyderabad (14.5) and Chennai `A' (14) are lying in second and third spots with three rounds remaining. The top two teams will represent the country in the Asian cities championships at Teheran from March 1.

Syed Anwar Shazuli let down Kancheepuram `A' when he turned down a draw offer from Vikramjit Singh of Hyderabad and then lost with white on the top board. Mari Arul had taken a quick draw with black for the defending champion against Rishipal Singh. C. Natarajan played superbly to down J. Ramakrishna of Hyderabad to level the scores.

Vinay survives

Vinay Kumar held the advantage for long against A. Sankar and it looked like a Hyderabad victory was on. A rook blunder by Vinay followed but the Hyderabad player went for a perpetual and claimed a draw by photographic three-time repetition of the position which the chief arbiter V. Ravichandran upheld.

Wins from senior players, N. Sudhakar Babu and V. Hariharan gave Chennai `B' a 2.5-1.5 win over Kozhikode. Chennai's Sai Meera was unlucky to lose but Hariharan came back from a poor position to win the game for himself and his team. On the top board, Prakash and K. Ratnakaran of Kozhikode drew.

Chennai `A' tasted its first big win, beating Ahmedabad 3.5-0.5, to take third place.

Important results:

Round 5: Kancheepuram `A' (16) drew with Hyderabad (14.5) 2-2, Chennai `B' (13.5) bt Kozhikode (13.5) 2.5-1.5, Chennai `A' (14) bt Ahmedabad (11) 3.5-0.5, Bangalore `B' (11) lost to Mangalore `A' (12.5) 1.5-2.5, Kancheepuram `B' (10.5) lost to Chennai `L' (11.5) 1.5-2.5, Chennai `C' (10) lost to Mangalore `B' (11) 1.5-2.5, Kancheepuram `C' (9.5) lost to Chennai `E' (11) 1.5-2.5.

Round 4: Kozhikode lost to Hyderabad 1.5-2.5, Mangalore `B' lost to Kancheepuram `A' 0-4, Chennai `B' lost to Chennai `A' 1.5-2.5, Ahmedabad bt Kancheepuram `B' 2.5-1.5.

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