Sport - Chess

India looking good to hold France

NEW DELHI: Grandmasters K. Sasikiran, Surya Shekhar Ganguly and G.N. Gopal came up with creditable draws against higher-rated French rivals in the seventh round of the Chess Olympiad at Dresden, Germany, on Thursday.

India, which defeated Bosnia and Herzegovina 2.5-1.5 on Wednesday with Sasikiran making the decisive difference on the top board, appeared good to prove equal to the seventh-seeded Frenchmen with P. Hari Krishna looking good to hold Maxime Vachier-Lagrave on the second board.

Sasikiran drew in 24 moves with Etienne Bacrot on the top board and Gopal produced a similar result in 33 moves against Vladislav Tkachiev.

In the ladies section, where India faced Bulgaria, Mary Ann Gomes registered her fourth victory in five games. However, Swati Ghate lost to Margarita Vaisla with black pieces. D. Harika and Tania Sachdev were involved in battles that had reached unclear positions when the game entered the fourth hour.

On Wednesday, the Indian ladies beat Italy 2.5-1.5. With five rounds to go, India was fifth in the Open section and eighth in the ladies category.

The results (sixth round): Open: Bosnia & Herzegovina (15) lost to India (16) 1.5-2.5 (Nikolic Predrag lost to K. Sasikiran; Borki Predojevic drew with P. Hari Krishna; Ibro Saric drew with Surya Shekhar Ganguly; Dalibor Stojanovic drew with Sandipan Chanda); Russia (16) bt England (15) 3-1; Ukraine (14) drew with Germany 1 (16.5) 2-2; Azerbaijan (16.5) lost to Armenia (18) 1.5-2.5; France (16.5) bt Poland (16.5) 3-1; Sweden (15) lost to Israel (16) 1.5-.2.5; Georgia (14) lost to China (16) 1.5-2.5; Romania (16) bt Bulgaria (17) 2.5-1.5; Colombia (14.5) lost to Hungary (15.5) 1.5-2.5; Netherlands (15.5) bt Moldova (13) 3-1.