The Hindu : Sport / Chess : Barua in sole lead

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Thursday, Jan 18, 2007
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Barua in sole lead

Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI: In a strange twist to the tale involving two Kolkata Grandmasters. Dibyendu Barua worked his way to a fifth straight victory and led after National champion Surya Shekhar Ganguly crashed to a stunning loss at the hands of G. Rohit in the fifth round of the Parsvnath International Open chess at the Indira Gandhi Stadium here.

On the last of the double-round days, Barua collared Arghyadip Das to emerge as the only winner among the eight leaders after four rounds.

The first three boards ended in draws with Abhijit Kunte escaping a certain defeat and then cashing in on Abhijeet Gupta's oversight to eye a possible win on the top board. The other two boards, involving Uzbeks Shukhrat Safin and Saidali Iuldachev on the second and Tamil Nadu's Deepan Chakkravarthy and Arun Prasad on the third, ended in quick, expected draws.

Ganguly fortunate

Ganguly, who has been struggling to battle the cold conditions prevailing in the Capital, was fortunate on Tuesday when young V.A.V. Rajesh turned down his draw offer and crashed to defeat. But on this day, Ganguly was not so fortunate.

Rohit, one of the new faces in the National team this year, won a rook for a knight and slowly enlarged his advantage in this Sicilian game. He eventually reached a winning endgame in 47 moves when his queen-pawn proved unstoppable for Ganguly.

Later, Barua was in his elements after sacrificing a knight for three pawns early in the game. The three-time National champion had ample compensation as he controlled the key squares. Before long, he added another pawn and easily completed an anticipated victory.

The results (fifth round, Indian unless stated): Abhijeet Gupta (4.5) drew with Abhijit Kunte (4.5); Shukhrat Safin (Uzb, 4.5) drew with Saidali Iuldachev (Uzb, 4.5); S. Arun Prasad (4.5) drew with Deepan Chakkravarthy (4.5); Arghyadip Das (4) lost to Dibyendu Barua (5); G.B. Prakash (3.5) lost to Alexey Dreev (Rus, 4.5); G. Rohit (4.5) bt Surya Shekhar Ganguly (3.5); Praveen Kumar (3.5) lost to Yuri Drozdovskij (Ukr, 4.5); Ziaur Rehman (Ban, 4.5) bt Mahmood Lodhi (Pak, 3.5); Pravin Thipsay (4.5) bt Vikramaditya Kamble (3.5); Swapnil Dhopade (3.5) lost to S. Kidambi (4.5); G.N. Gopal (4) drew with Shashikant Kutwal (4); Somak Palit (4) drew with Sriram Jha (4); Rahul Sangma (3.5) lost to Poobesh Anand (4.5); Diwakar Prasad Singh (3.5) drew with T. Purushothaman (3.5); Ahmed Adly (Egy, 4) bt G.B. Joshi (3); C. Natarajan (3) lost to Abdulla Al-Rakib (Ban, 4); Neelotpal Das (4) bt Kiran Monisha Mohanty (3); M. Srinivasa Rao (3.5) drew with M.R. Venkatesh (3.5); O.T. Anil Kumar (3.5) drew with S. Vijayalakshmi (3.5); Niaz Murshed (Ban, 3.5) drew with Mohammad Ali (3.5); Aditya Udeshi (3) lost to Ezat Mohammed (Egy, 4).

Fourth round: Kunte bt S.P. Sethuraman; Iuldachev bt Roktim Bandyopadhyay; Deepan bt P.D.S. Girinath; Barua bt Nasir Ahmed; Chandrashekhar Gokhale lost to Abhijeet Gupta; Kidambi drew with Palit; Varugeese Koshy lost to Safin; Jha drew with Sangma; Arun bt Udeshi; Vinoth Kumar lost to Arghyadip; Dreev bt Mehdi Hasan; Ganguly bt Sudhakar Babu; Drozdovskij bt Rahul Shetty; Shyam Sundar lost to Ziaur Rehman; Nikhil Shyam drew with Ahmed Adly.

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