Tejas Bakre emerges sole leader

By Raghunandan Gokhale

MUMBAI, SEPT. 3. International Master and former winner Tejas Bakre (4.5) of India shot into the lead with an attacking win over team mate S. Satyapragyan (3.5) in the fifth round of Asian junior chess championship being held at Hotel Avion here today.

Top seeded IM P. Harikrishna (4), who scored an important win over second seeded IM Surya Sekhar Ganguly (India), S. Kidambi and Said Rakhimov (Kazakstan) are half point behind leader Tejas.

In the Girls section, IWM Koneru Humpy (4.5) of India was lucky to escape with a draw against Elena Levushkina (UZB) while Yu Ting (4) of China outwitted Tania Sachdev (3) to remain within striking distance of Humpy.

Tejas Bakre unveiled a new move on his 12th turn against Satyapragyan in Sicilian Najdorf Defence. He further sacrificed a piece on 16th move to launch a whirlwind on he Black King. After thinking for a long time Satya came up with a defence which cost him three pawns for an exchange. Thereafter it was easy for Tejas to pocket the point after 40 moves.

In Neo-Grunfeld defence, Harikrishna played an original pawn sacrifice on 21st move to activate his pieces against Ganguly.

The top seed from Wipro tied down Ganguly's Black army with accurate moves. Hari's tactical stroke on 36th move netted him a piece. Ganguly put a vain battle till 51st move but resigned in hopeless position.

Valay Parikh (3) likes to play unorthodox openings. His Wing Gambit against IM S. Kidambi's Sicilian Defence rattled Kidambi so much that Valay obtained a promising position against the former National Junior Champion. However Valay played indifferently and soon lost the game.

Said Rakhimbov (4) of Kazakstan took just 19 moves to despatch Al Sayed Mohammad (Quatar) in English Opening. Rakhimbov was pleasantly surprised to see the Qatar junior blundering and resigning immediately much to the dismay of Qatar's coach GM Alexy Kuzmin.

Elena Levushkina will never forgive herself for allowing the top seeded Humpy to escape for lack of chess rules. With her Panov- Botwinnik attack against Humpy's CaroKann Defence, Elena obtained a dangerous attack thanks to Humpy's stranded Knight on the Queens wing in the early middle game. Humpy lost a piece on 37th move as the attack was too strong.

Elena Levushkina was very nervous and tried to find an immediate win in that position. She was moving her pieces aimlessly till she found a proper plan.

But Humpy was alert to the possibility of a draw. She claimed a draw by photographic repetition. Arbiter V. Ravichandran agreed with her claim and awarded half a point to her.

Tania Sachdev lost a marathon battle against Chinese Yu Ting after missing a draw on 41st move. In Sicilian Classical Dragon, Tania (White) lost an Exchange on 25th move but nearly pulled off a draw.

But once she missed the opportunity, Yu played well to win the game in 85 moves.

Meenakshi, encouraged by the arrival of elder sister WGM Vijayalaxmi, outwitted National Junior Girls Champion Nisha Mohota who played an unsound piece sacrifice on 19th move in Semi Slav Defence. After that Meenakshi handled the technical part well to win the game in 51 moves.

The results (fifth round):

Boys: 1. Tejas Bakre (Ind) 4.5 bt S. Satyapragyan (Ind) 3.5, 2. P. Harikrishna (Ind)4 bt S. S .Ganguly (Ind) 3.5, 3. Valay Parikh (Ind)3 lost to S. Kidambi (Ind) 4, 4. Said Rakhimbekov (Kaz) 4 bt Al Sayed (Qat) 3, 5. Ghaem Maghami (Iran) 3.5 bt Mark Paragua (Phi) 2.5, 6. Filipov Anton (Uzb) 2.5 drew with C. J. Arvind (Ind) 2.5, 7. Neelotpal Das (Ind) 3 bt P. Maheshchandran (Ind) 2, 8. Enamul Hossain (Ban) 3 bt Mathew Sonter (Aus) 2, 9. John Paul Gomez (Phi) 2.5 drew Vikramaditya Kamble (Ind) 2.5, 10. Syed Hassan (Pak) 3 bt Taher Mulla (Kuw) 1.5, 11. Arjun Tiwari (Ind) 1.5 lost to Du Shan (Chi) 2.5, 12. Akshayraj Kore (Ind) 2 bt M. Satyajit (Ind) 1.5, 13. Athukorala (Sri) 1 lost to Prathmesh Mokal (Ind) 2, 14. Annaberdiev Meilies (Tur) 2 bt Himanshu Kumar (Ind) 1.

Girls: 1. Elena Levushkina (UZB) 3.5 drew with Koneru Humpy (Ind) 4.5, Tania Sachdev (Ind) 3 lost to Yu Ting (Chi) 4, 3. Nisha Mohota (Ind) 2.5 lost to S. Meenakshi (Ind) 3.5, 4. Aarthie Ramaswami (Ind) 3 bt J. E. Kavita (Ind) 2, 5. Swati Ghate (Ind) 2.5 drew with Chauthi Ngoc Gioa (Vie) 2, 6. Madina Duisenova (KAZ) 2.5 bt Anupama Konara (Sri) 1.5, 7. Feroza Haque (Ban) 0.5 drew with Beverly Mendoza (PHI) 2, 8. Pazha Sivakame (Ind) 1 lost to Y Prathiba (Ind) 2.

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