The Hindu : Sport / Chess : Happy to make a comeback: Negi

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Friday, Feb 01, 2008
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Sport - Chess

Happy to make a comeback: Negi

Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI: Grandmaster Parimarjan Negi may be struggling a bit to come to grips with time-management over a chessboard. But fortunately for the youngster, his timing has been perfect in finding the form that deserted him late last year.

After a runner-up finish in the ‘C’ division of the premier Corus chess tournament at Wijk aan Zee earlier this week, Negi is brimming with confidence. This could well signal some testing times for the senior Grandmasters of the country when they all come together for the National ‘A’ chess championship beginning in Chennai on February 3. “I feel good that I played some good games after starting poorly in Corus,” said Negi while looking back on his best-ever finish in an international meet after scoring 8 points from 13 rounds. “The tally was satisfactory in many ways, especially after losing the first two rounds. Recently, in the Commonwealth championship here and the Asian junior championship in Mumbai, whenever I lost, my game just collapsed and I took time to recover.

“But in Corus, I was happy that I kept scoring in such a strong field. I could use some strong ideas and win when I needed to. I tried some new openings as well. It felt good that even after losing the first two rounds, I came within a victory of winning the title,” he said. Negi performed way above his rating of 2526 to gain around 10 rating points. That offsets the loss of points he suffered in Delhi and Mumbai in December. One of the factors for this improved performance was the presence of coach Vladimir Chuchelov. Negi had prepared with the 38-year-old and took him along for the competition.