Sport - Chess

Three share lead in girls' section

By Our Sports Reporter

VIJAYAWADA May 2 . M. Kasturi, defending champion J.E. Kavitha and Soumya Swaminathan shared the lead with 5.5 points each after the girls seventh round.

The fifth day of the GMC Balayogi memorial National junior chess championships at the Krishnaveni Residential Talent School here on Thursday was marked by draws, as many contests on the top boards ended in deadlock.

Among the boys, Abhijeet Gupta stayed ahead with five points, followed half a point behind by Poobesh Anand.

Kasturi and Anuprita Patil went through the Alapin-Sicilian overtures. But for White's isolated pawn, both were equal. After exchange of pieces, Kasturi's miscalculation on the 22nd cost her the d4 pawn.

In the rook ending, white was left with two pawns against the rival's three on kingside. Kasturi again erred in the exchange of rooks. The pawn ending presented possibilities of a win for Patil, who however missed out on them and called for a truce on the 44th.

After the king pawn-Petroff preliminaries, Soumya Swaminathan and P. Priya effected an early exchange of queens. Black's flawed f5 on the 15th enhanced white's position. In time trouble, white had an edge as black allowed two pieces for a rook. On the 34th, white bungled with her h2 pawn. The duo decided on a draw on the 46th.

Nabeela Farheen set off to a Ruy Lopez opening against N. Vinuthna on the third board and black's Qd6 on the 28th cost her a pawn. After trading queens, the game went into double rook and opposite colour bishop ending. On the 41st, there was an exchange of a pair of rooks, thanks to which Black managed a draw.

Two slips by Rahul Sangma — Qe2 on the 14th and Nc5 four moves later — saw Abhijeet Gupta bring his pawn to the centre and then play d5. For the latter, the rest was a cakewalk.

Saptarshi Roy's Nc3 on the second was a deviation from the book and Poobesh Anand responded with Bf5, giving himself enough room to develop his game from there. Black's queenside castling on the 13th wrested the initiative. White played Ne5 five moves later, which black resisted with f6, the advantage again swinging Black's way. Bogged down in time pressure, Roy resigned on the 37th.

The results:

Girls (seventh round): Soumya Swaminathan (Mah) 5.5 drew with P. Priya (TN) 5.5, M. Kasturi (TN) 5.5 drew with Anuprita Patil (Mah) 5, N. Vinuthna (AP) 5 drew with S. Nabeela Farheen (TN) 5, H. Nilavoli (CCA) 4.5 lost to J.E. Kavitha (TN) 5.5, K.M. Mohanty (Ori) 4.5 drew with Anuradha Beniwal (Har) 4.5, Ashwathy Balagopalan (Ker) 4 lost to M. Raja Darshini (ECC) 5, Baisaki Das (Ben) 3.5 lost to N. Sandhya (Ker) 5, T. Vennela (AP) 4 drew with I. Ramya Krishna (AP) 4, K.L. Praneetha (AP) 4 drew with Malar Selvi (T. Nagar) 3.5, Ayushi Raichoudhury (Ori) 3.5 drew with Shraddha Samani (Mah) 3.5, K. Chandrahawsa (AP) 4 bt P. Ghosh (Ben) 3, Swetha Narayanan (Mount CA) 3 lost to Supriya Maji (Goodricke) 4, K. Nayana (AP) 2.5 lost to Aneeqa Tahseen (Capa) 4, Priyanka S. Kale (Kar) 2.5 lost to C. Delphin (MCA) 3.5, G. Pratheeka (Kar) 2.5 lost to Amrutha Mokal (Mah) 3.5, T. Amrutha Varshini (AP) 2 lost to T. Raj Surya (CCA) 3.5, K. Geetha Sruthi (AP) 3 bt Dipmala Chande (Guj) 2, T. Aravinda Lochani (AP) 3 bt K. Sirisha (AP) 2, M. Veena Mounica (AP) 2 drew with G. Sandhya (AP) 2.5, G. Raja Sree (AP) 1 lost to Tejaswini (AP) 2, K. Sri Laxmi (AP) 2 bt T. Srijahnavi (AP).

Boys (fifth round): Rahul Sangma (Good) 3.5 lost to Abhijith Gupta (Raj) 5, Sayantan Dutta (Good) 4 drew with Somak Palit (Good) 4, Saptarshi Roy (Good) 3.5 lost to S. Poobesh Anand (TN) 4.5, Deepan Chakravarthy (ECC) 3.5 drew with K. Vijaya Keerthi (Mys) 3.5, Arghyadip Das (NCA) 4 bt Santosh Sapkal (Mah) 3, G. Rohith (AP) 4 bt D. Sai Srinivas (AP) 3, R. Siddhartha (CCA) 3.5 drew with Thanmay Raj Pathak (Pune) 3.5, T. Purushothaman (AP) 4 bt G.N. Gopal (Lakshw) 3, Praveen Kumar (Chrom) 3.5 drew with Swaraj Palit (Jhar) 3.5, Sohan Phadke (Mah) 2.5 lost to M.R. Venkatesh (Capa) 3.5, Soumya Ranjan Mishra (Ori) 3.5 bt S. Raghu Raman (TN) 2.5, K. Nikhilesh Kumar (AP) 3.5 bt M.K. Narasimhan (T. Nagar) 2.5, Jagadeesh (AP) 3.5 bt K. Sai Krishna (AP) 2.5, Sunny Purohit (Guj) 2.5 lost to Omkar Patwardhan (Mah) 3.5, P. Praveen Prasad (AP) 3 bt B. Kranthi Kumar (AP) 2, Himanshu Kumar (Del) 2.5 drew with Swapnil Sunil Dhopade (Mah) 2.5, T.G. Mounish (AP) 2 lost to Pratik R. Sriwas (Mah) 3, Byomakesh Nayak (Ori) 2.5 drew with Akshaya Raj Kore (MCA) 2.5, M. Satyajith (AP) 3 bt P.L. Sahithi (AP) 2, P. Maheswaran (TN) 3 bt V.K. Agarwal (AP) 2.

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