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Laxman shocks Balasubramaniam

By Our Chess Correspondent

Chennai July 22. Teenaged International Master norm holder Rajaram Laxman of Chennai shocked top seed R. Balasubramaniam of ICF to win the 1st Avadi Chess Academy's FIDE rated Open chess tournament that concluded here at the Mayor Radhakrishnan Stadium in Egmore on Monday.

Laxman, 19, the tall and well built second year B.A. Psychology correspondence student from Annamalai University preyed on undefended pawns of his fancied opponent to win a 52-move game for his eighth victory and clear title.

Laxman lost to Milind Gawade and beat the rest of his opponents for his eight points from nine rounds.

Hoping for an early central pawn break in the black side of the queen's gambit declined, exchange variation, Balasubramaniam paid for this mistake losing pawns and he lost a lopsided battle when white stayed ahead after each tactic. However, Balasubramaniam told The Hindu, "I had a draw but missed it.''

Laxman recalls, "my World Junior 1998 performance at Kozhikode is the best and I made an IM norm there.'' Speaking to The Hindu, he said, "the field I played here was not tough, so this is not my best result.''

He however accepted that the Rs.10,000 first prize sponsored by Win TV is his biggest purse. This is his first major tournament title in which he started as ninth seed.

Despite tasting his first defeat, Balasubramaniam finished second, half a point behind the winner with 7.5 points. His tie-break score was better than both, D.P. Singh and C.J. Arvind, who also scored the same 7.5.

Diwakar Prasad Singh of Jamshedpur, who led the tournament briefly, signed off with a brilliant queen sacrifice to win against S. Arun Prasad of Salem for the third place.

C.J. Arvind who defeated former National `A' player K.V. Shantharam with ease in 26 moves finished fourth and had the credit of being the tournament's only undefeated player.

Final placings, prize list (in tie-break order): 1 R.R. Laxman 8/9; 2 R. Balasubramaniam 7.5; 3 D.P. Singh 7.5; 4 C.J. Arvind 7.5; 5-8 A. Shankar, S. Mari Arul, K. Gopalakrishnan, S.R. Mishra 7 each; 9-19 B.T. Muralikrishnan, S. Arun Prasad, K. Chakravarthi, T.J. Suresh Kumar, Ashwani Tiwari, D. Ravi Shankar, M. Vinoth Kumar, Y. Prathiba, P. Poobhalan, K. Visweswaran, Anirban Guharoy 6.5 each; 20 D. Lakshmana Rao 6.

Special prizes: Blind players: K. Muthuraman 3.5, S. Dayalan 3. Under-8: N. Srinath 4.5. Under-10: S.P. Sethuraman 6. Under-12: Sai Srinivas 5.5. Under-14: T. Abhay 6. Senior: P.S. Vaidyanathan 4.

Important results (round nine): R.R. Laxman 8 bt R. Balasubramaniam 7.5, D.P. Singh 7.5 bt S. Arun Prasad 6.5, C.J. Arvind 7.5 bt K.V. Shantharam 6, T.J. Suresh Kumar 6.5 drew with A. Shankar 7, S. Mari Arul 7 bt T. Abhay 6, K. Gopalakrishnan 7 bt D. Lakshmana Rao 6, S.R. Mishra 7 bt D. Devendrakumar 6, K. Chakravarthi 6.5 drew with D. Ravi Shankar 6.5, G. Srikanth 6 lost to K. Visweswaran 6.5, Sai Meera Ravi 6 drew with Vikramaditya Kamble 6, B.T. Muralikrishnan 6.5 bt M.R. Sangeetha 5.5, M.J. Noohu 5.5 lost to P. Poobhalan 6.5, V. Vijay Amal Raj 5.5 lost to Anirban Guharoy 6.5, Sujit Kumar Sinha 5.5 lost to Y. Prathiba 6.5, M. Vinoth Kumar 6.5 bt C.S. Sridhar 5.5, Ashwani Tiwari 6.5 bt R. Muralidharam 5.5, T.V. Karthikeyan 6 bt J. Saravana Kumar 5.5, Binju Oomen 5 lost to Hari Om Sharma 6, C. Praveenkumar 6 bt V. Haribalu 5, Hemant Kumar Mandhare 6 bt (w.o.) S. Banupriya 5, Sai Srinivas 5.5 drew with G. Benoglad 5.5, S. Karthikeyan 5 lost to M. Vinodh Kumar 6, C. Delphin 6 bt Swapnil S. Dhopade 5, S.P. Sethuraman 6 bt A. Arun 5, H. Nilavoli 6 bt Vaishak Venkat 5, Sridharan Ramanath 5.5 drew with T.U. Navin Kanna 5.5, J.E. Kavitha 5.5 drew with M. Vijay Anand 5.5, T.B. Sundar 5 lost to S. Raghuraman 6, S. Venkatsundaram 6 bt C. Natarajan 4.5, Adway Chowdhuri 5.5 bt B. Adiban 4.5.

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