Date:12/07/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/07/12/stories/2008071255851700.htm

Sport - Chess

Abhijeet held

NEW DELHI: Abhijeet Gupta drew with Azerbaijan’s Rashad Babaev to reach 6.5 points after eight rounds of the Benasque International Open chess tournament at Benasque, Spain, on Thursday.

On a day when six of the top seven boards ended as draws, Abhijeet shared the third spot with 14 others.

Peru’s Julio Granda Zuniga defeated Germany’s Arkadij Rotstein to join overnight leader Spain’s Elizbar Ubilava in the lead at seven points.

The results:

Eighth round (involving Indians): Rashad Babaev (Aze, 6.5) drew with Abhijeet Gupta (6.5); Soumya Swaminathan (5.5) lost to Vladimir Burmakin (Rus, 6); Mihail Marin (Ukr, 5.5) drew with Swapnil Dhopade (5.5).

Vishnu Prasanna (5) lost to Vlastimil Jansa (Cze, 6); R. B. Ramesh (6) bt Daniel Dvirnyy (Ita, 5); Neelotpal Das (6) bt Angel Martin Gonzales (Esp, 5); D. Harika (5.5) drew with Manuel Pena Gomez (Esp, 5.5).

M. R. Lalith Babu (5) lost to Sandro Pozo Vera (Cub, 6); Shyam Sundar (6) bt Juan Reyes (Per, 5); B. Adhiban (5.5) drew with Prasanna Rao (5.5).

K. Priyadarshan (4.5) lost to Karen Movsziszian (Arm, 5.5); Deep Sengupta (5.5) bt Miguel Senlle Caride (Esp, 4.5).

S. P. Sethuraman (5.5) bt Jorge Luis Navarro Alonso (Esp, 4.5); S. Meenakshi (5.5) bt Jesus Pavon Cardenas (Esp, 4.5).

Mathew Tan (Isr, 5) drew with A. Niji (5); Mary Ann Gomes (5) drew with Angelico Armando Camilo (Ang, 5).

Alexandre Nascimento (Ang, 4.5) lost to S. Nitin (5.5); Santiago de Paz Nistal (Esp, 4) lost to T. Abhay (5).

Kruttika Nadig (5) bt Santiago Bailo Remacha (Esp, 4); Antonio Garcia Rodriguez (Esp, 4) lost to R. Preethi (5). Devangi Patankar (5) bt Bhakti Kulkarni (4).

Victor Sanchez-Alarcos Galian (Esp, 5) bt Pon N. Krithika (4); Juan Carlos Garcia Rodriguez (Esp, 4) lost to G. V. Sai Krishna (5).

Alvaro Sanmartin Agustin (Esp, 3.5) lost to Antonio Viani D’cunha (4.5); Iluminada Minguez Greciano (Esp, 3.5) lost to P. Uthra (4.5).

Alberto Aranzana Areste (Esp, 4) bt S. V. Sathyapriya (3); C. P. Aatirah (4) bt Bingen Urbieta Aldalur (Esp, 3).