Surya Sekhar Ganguly and Sasikiran Krishnan shine in National Chess Championship

Surya Sekhar Ganguly and Sasikiran Krishnan continued their impressive runs in the National Chess Championship with strong victories in the fourth round. Both players displayed exceptional skills, while other matches saw notable wins and draws from top players

Hyderabad: Former Asian champion, second-seeded Surya Sekhar Ganguly, and Sasikiran Krishnan, the second Indian player to reach a 2700 rating after Anand, both from PSPB, showcased their mastery in the fourth round of the National Chess Championship at Vignan University in Guntur.

In the English opening, IM Manish Anto Cristiano of Tamil Nadu fought valiantly, even by sacrificing his bishop. But Ganguly’s exchange sacrifice offer and then a rook offer slowly tilted the game in his favour. The extra bishop proved vital to post a win in 46 moves.

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Sasikiran registered his fourth consecutive victory of the tournament in style, against Harshit Ranjan Sahu of Odisha, in a Petrov’s defence by the latter. Launching a heavy attack with his queen and rooks, Sasikiran sacrificed his queen for a bishop and rook to weave a checkmating net in 32 moves.

Andhra’s grandmaster MR Lalith Babu of PSPB played a steady French Defence against Alekhya Mukhopadhyay, exchanging all the pieces, except a rook each by move 22. But the voluntary exchange of the final piece by Alekhya later proved costly for him, as Lalith handled the pawn ending in a better manner.

Third-seeded SP Sethuraman escaped from the jaws of defeat because of a solitary mistake by IM Aaditya Dingra of Haryana. Playing black, former national champion Sethuraman did not handle the Philidor Defence properly, allowing Aaditya to gain an upper hand in the opening phase of the game. Reeling off good move after move, Aaditya, poised for a win, made a wrong pawn capture, providing a big relief to Sethu, and the game ended in a tame draw.

After an upset draw in the third round, top seed P. Iniyan of Tamil Nadu was back to business with a fine victory over Shreyas Das of Delhi in a Queen’s Gambit Declined game, adopted by the latter. Former Tamil Nadu champion N Surendran held GM Vignesh NR of Railways to a draw, and so did GM Deep Sengupta of PSPB against Esshan Wadhawan of Delhi.

The longest game of the tournament so far was between Andhra’s international master S. Ravi Teja of Railways and Jihan Tejas Shah of Gujarat, wherein Ravi checkmated Jihan with his bishop and knight in 140 moves.