Indians off to a good start

BIEL (SWITZERLAND), JULY 25. All five Indian players won their first round games to begin their campaigns in style in the Biel Open chess championship here.

International Master R.B. Ramesh, who has a rating of 2450, faced stiff resistance from the lowly-rated Mark Rufener (2138) on a day which saw no major upsets.

Ramesh, after obtaining a commanding position from the black side of the kings Indian Saemisch variation, blundered two pieces for a rook. He then managed to complicate things fairly to outwit his opponent in an interesting endgame in 64 moves.

IM V.Saravanan (2412) won against Weiland (2093) from the white side of the modern defence.

Saravanan then went on to sacrifice his knight temporarily to win two pawns forcing his opponent to resign on the 17th move.

Young Sundararajan Kidambi (2404) got a solid positional advantage from the white side of the queen gambit declined Lasker variation against Gross Henrique.

Kidambi doubled his rooks on the C-file and won the C5 pawn. He then showed good technique to win the game comfortably in 31 moves.

IM-elect T.S. Ravi (2385) produced a miniature against Sutev Stephan (2070) from the black side of the English symmetrical structure and won a pawn quite early in the opening.

IM Konguvel (2377) played the Ruy Lopez opening against Montavon. His opponent tried to open the position prematurely and lost his central E5 pawn. He conducted a direct Kingside attack and won the game in 28 moves.

Important results: 1. GM Boris Avrukh (1) bt C.Hess (0); 2. Beck John (0) lost to GM Sturva (1); 3. Van Schaanden (0) lost to GM ShariyazdaNov (1); 4. GM Tukmakov (1) bt Schane Felferg (0); 5. GM Alexander Galkin (1) bt V.Adam (0); 6. Mark Rufener (0) lost to Im R.B.Ramesh (1); 7. S.Kidambi (1) bt Gross Henrique (0); 8. IM Saravanan (1) bt Weiland (0); 9. Suter Stephan (0) lost to T.S. Ravi (1); 10. IM P.Konguvel (1) bt Mantavon (0).

- PTI

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