Sport - Chess

Sasikiran scores win

NEW DELHI: Country’s latest Grandmaster G. N. Gopal stretched former World champion Rustam Kasimdzhanov before joining three more illustrious teammates on the sidelines after the first round of the World Cup chess championship at Khanty Mansisyk on Monday.

K. Sasikiran was the only Indian to survive the first round after scoring a 3.5-2.5 victory over lower rated Sergei Zhigalkov of Belarus. Sasikiran won the first of the blitz games and drew the next to make the second round.

Gopal, though among the first round losers, exceeded all expectations against Kasimdzhanov. He proved equal to the Uzbek in the two classical games and went on to produce similar results in the two rapid battles.

However, in the five-minute blitz games, 18-year-old Gopal’s lack of experience benefited Kasimdzhanov who won both the games.

Earlier, Surya Shekhar Ganguly, P. Hari Krishna and Abhijit Kunte had joined the list of first-round losers. Ganguly lost the opening classical game with black pieces against the Netherlands’ Sergei Tiviakov and drew the next to lose 0.5-1.5 on Sunday.

Hari could not justify his seeding and lost the second rapid game with white against China’s Zao Jun. Before this decisive battle, the players had drawn two classical games and one rapid clash.