Sport - Chess

India slips to joint third

NEW DELHI: Defending champion India got the script horribly wrong against Turkey ‘A’ and crashed to a shocking 1.5-2.5 defeat in the eighth round of the World Youth (under-16) Chess Olympiad at Mersin, Turkey, on Saturday.

India, which crushed Georgia 3.5-0.5 to share the lead with Armenia after seven rounds, failed to win the match where it had higher rated player on each of the four boards.

As a result, India slipped to the joint third place with Azerbaijan at 21 points.

Top seed Russia crushed Sri Lanka 4-0 and regained the lead at 22.5. Philippines was second with 22 points.

Leading results: Eighth round: Turkey ‘A’ (20) beat India (21) 2.5-1.5 (Mustafa Yilmaz bt B. Adhiban; Burak Firat drew with S.P. Sethuraman; Mert Ylmazyerli lost to Shyam Sundar; Irmak Sipahioglu bt Prasanna Rao); Azerbaijan (21) bt Armenia (20.5) 3-1; England (16.5) lost to Philippines (22) 1-3; Russia (22.5) bt Sri Lanka (14.5) 4-0; Georgia (20) bt Slovakia (16).

Seventh round: India beat Georgia 3.5-0.5 (Adhiban bt Levan Bregadze; Sethuraman bt Irakli Janiashakvili; Shyam Sundar drew with Nodar Davarashvili; Prasanna bt Giorgi Nikolashvili); Philippines bt Russia 3-1; Armenia bt England 4-0; Azerbaijan bt Slovakia 3-1.

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