Date:12/08/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/08/12/stories/2008081255151800.htm

Sport - Chess

Sasikiran wins title; Harika maintains lead

NEW DELHI: D. Harika checkmated Bulgaria’s Adriana Nikolova to maintain her half-point lead after the girls’ eighth round in the World junior chess championship at Gaziantep, Turkey, on Sunday.

The top seeded Andhra girl now has seven points and plays teammate Soumya Swaminathan in the ninth round as Indian girls kept alive hopes of bringing home more than one medal.

In the open section, Deep Sengupta surprised fifth seeded German Grandmaster David Baramidze, Parimarjan Negi outwitted 15th seed GM Bonelli Eduardo Pat Iturrizaga of Venezuela and Aswin Jayaram held seventh seed GM Luka Lenic.

However, the Indian boys were still some distance away from raising hopes of a medal. Five rounds remain.

At Warsaw, favourite K. Sasikiran took a 24-move draw from Poland’s Michal Krasenkow in the ninth round to win the Najdorf memorial tournament.

Sasikiran tallied 6.5 points to stay one point clear of runner-up Tomi Nyback of Finland in the 10-player round-robin event.

In Athens, International Master V. Saravanan drew with fifth seeded Grandmaster Dmitry Svetushkin in the second round of the Acropolis International tournament.

The results (involving Indians):

World juniors (eighth round): Open: Parimarjan Negi (5.5) bt Bonelli Eduardo Pat Iturrizaga (Ven, 4.5); Roman Nechepurenko (Rus, 5) drew with Abhijeet Gupta (5); Deep Sengupta (5) bt David Baramidze (Ger, 4); Aswin Jayaram (4.5) drew with Luka Lenic (Slo, 4.5); G. N. Gopal (4.5) drew with P. Karthikeyan (4.5); Pascua Haridas (Phi, 4) lost to S. Arun Prasad (5); Karl McPhillips (Irl, 3.5) drew with Akshayraj Kore (3.5); Vishnu Prasanna (4) bt Amar Salihovic (Bih, 3); Ilic Slavisa (Bih, 3.5) bt Sahaj Grover (2.5).

Girls: Adrina Nikolova (Bul, 5.5) lost to D. Harika (7); Soumya Swaminathan (6) bt Tatev Abrahamyan (USA, 5); R. Preethi (5) lost to Miranda Mikadze (Geo, 6); Anna Gasik (Pol, 4.5) drew with Mary Ann Gomes (4.5); Padmini Rout (4) lost to Kruttika Nadig (5).

Acropolis International (second round): Dmitry Svetushkin (Mda, 1.5) drew with V. Saravanan (1.5); Saptarshi Roy Chowdhury (1.5) bt Ioulia Makka (Gre, 0.5); (first round): Nikolaos Skiadopoulos (Gre) drew with Saptarshi; Saravanan bt Hrisanthos Pountzas (Gre).