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Chess
By P. K. Ajith Kumar
India's Saimeera Ravi watches compatriot Tania Sachdev (right) play against Maria Sergeyeva of Kazakhstan in the Asian women's championship at Kozhikode on Saturday.
The lucky win also gave the top seed from Vijayawada the sole lead, with just two rounds remaining. She now has six points, a lead of one point, and has moved closer to the title. Dronavalli Harika's unbeaten run came to an end when she was soundly beaten by a cautious S. Vijayalakshmi, who is one of the four players in the second position with five points each. The others are Harika and the two Vietnamese girls, former champion Hoang Thanh Trang and Le Kieu Thien Kim. Meanwhile Wang Pin's nightmare in the Kerala monsoon continued. The third seed from China suffered her fourth defeat to lesser seeded players in five games, when she was shocked by Saimeera Ravi, who is nearly 300 Elo points below her. On the top board, Humpy, who played Reti Opening, faced certain defeat, when Zhao Xue bailed her out with a reckless rook move. That move, the 45th, proved costly for the second seed, who was two pawns up at that stage. Black had to resign just seven moves later. ``Yes, I was lucky,'' admitted Humpy. ``I was cautious,'' said Viji about her 76-move win on the second board. She surprised her rival with Larsen Attack, and reached a strong position as early as the 20th move, following the exchange of all pieces except the rooks. She got an open file in the centre and her rooks looked much more menacing than black's. Harika finally gave up when one of white's two connected passers reached the seventh rank. Saimeera joked Wang Pin may never want to come to India after losing to three Indians. She won in 48 moves of Closed Sicilian, having got a rook on the 26th move. On boards three and four, Le Kieu surprised Xu Yuanyuan in 50 moves of Semi-Slav, while Hoang beat Wang Yu in 29 moves of Dutch Defence. The results (seventh round; Indians unless otherwise specified): Koneru Humpy 6 bt Zhao Xue (Chn) 4.5; S. Vijayalakshmi 5 bt Dronavalli Harika 5; Le Kieu Thien Kim (Vie) 5 bt Xu Yuanyuan (Chn) 4.5; Wang Yu (Chn) 4 lost to Hoang Thanh Trang (Vie) 5; Bhagyashree Thipsay 4.5 drew with Zhang Jilin (Chn) 4.5; Tania Sachdev 4 drew with Maria Sergeyeva (Kaz) 4; Gu Xiaobing (Chn) 4 drew with M. Safira Shanaz (Chn) 4; Huang Qian (Chn) 4 drew with Aarthie Ramaswamy 4; Nisha Mohota 3 lost to Li Ruofan (Chn) 4.5; Swati Ghate 3 lost to S. Meenakshi 4; Shen Yang (Chn) 4 bt Tian Tian (Chn) 3; Nguyen Thi Thanh Anh (Vie) 3.5 Ruan Lufei (Chn) 3; Saimeera Ravi 3.5 bt Wang Pin (Chn) 2.5; Y. Prathiba 3.5 bt Anupama Gokhale 2.5; J.E. Kavitha 3.5 bt Koneru Chandra Hawsa 2.5; Vineetha Wijesuriya (Sri) 3 bt P. Priya 2; Eesha Karvade 2.5 bt K. Lakshmi Praneetha 1; Shabana Parveen (Ban) 1.5 lost to M.R. Sangeetha 2; Lidya Malinicheva (Uzb) 0.5 lost to Swati Mohota 1.5.
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