Chess: Arjun Erigaise Downs Anton Guijarro; Narayanan Holds Abdusattorov Nodirbek In Grand Swiss

Playing his trademark uncompromising chess, Grandmaster Arjun Erigaise scored a thumping victory over Anton Guijarro of Spain while S L Narayanan did well to hold GM Abdusattorov Nodirbek to a draw in the second round of FIDE Grand Swiss. Arjun, who has been losing pace towards the end, decided to cross the minefield in top gear as he went for unwarranted complications right from the beginning out of a Reti opening game by Guijarrov who played white.

The game seemed evenly poised but when it comes to complications Arjun has steely nerves. Sacrificing a pawn in the middle game the Warangal-based caught his Spanish counterpart completely off guard and a simple exchange sacrifice netted him another white piece in a couple of moves.

Guijarrov fought on for a long time but the writing was on the wall and Arjun wrapped it up without giving a second chance. After 40 moves it was an inevitable checkmate that forced Guijarro’s resignation.

Narayanan is someone people talk about but his low profile has not helped him claim much. Kerala’s strongest player finished as the best Indian bagging the third place in the Qatar masters just before this event and it doesn’t look like he will stop here.

Playing the black side of a Queen’s Gambit declined against Nodirbek, Narayanan was at ease right from the word go, won a pawn and when he was about to lose it back, too many pieces had changed hands and the position was just a draw. It took just 33 moves.

Raunak Sadhwani continued with his solid performance after holding fourth seed Anish Giri of Holland in round one. Raunak played out another draw with pre-event favourite Hikaru Nakamura of United States. It turned out to be a quick game lasting just 25 moves when the players decided to repeat moves with Raunak having some pressure on Nakamura.

After a shocking loss in the first round from a position of strength against Erwin L’ami of Holland, Grandmaster Vidit Gujrathi came back in to reckoning with a hard-earned victory over compatriot Abhijeet Gupta.

From what looked like a level endgame, Gujrathi capitalised on his better placed pieces to romp home with some excellent technique.

In the women’s section former world champion Tan Zhongyi showed her endgame skills to down Divya Deshmukh while B Savitha Shree found former World champion Antoaneta Stefanova too tough to handle.

Grandmaster D Harika was held to a second draw by Hoang Thang Trang of Hungary while Tani Sachdev followed suit against Dinara Wagner of Germany.

Important and Indian results round two (Indians unless stated): Fabiano Caruana (Usa, 2) beat Hans Moke Niemann USA, 1); Alexandr Predke (Srb, 2) beat Jan-Krzysztof Duda (Pol, 1); Abdusattorov Nodirbek (Uzb, 1.5) drew with S L Narayanan (1.5); Anton Guijarro David (Esp, 1) lost to Arjun Erigaisi (2); Sameul Sevian (USA, 1.5) drew with Aravindh Chithambaram (1.5); Vladimir Fedoseev (Slo, 1) lost to Erwin L’ami (Ned, 2); Raunak Sadhwani (1) drew with Hikaru Nakamura (USA , 1); D Gukesh (1) drew with Ruslan Ponomariov (Ukr, 1): Volodar Murzin (FID, 1) drew with R Praggnanandhaa (1); Aryan Chopra (1) drew with Vincent Keymer (Ger, 1); Aryan Tari (Nor, 1.5) beat P Harikrishna (0.5); Murali Karthikeyan (0.5) lost to Sam Shankland (USA, 1.5); Vladislav Artemiev (FID, 1) drew with Leon Luke Mendonca (1); Nihal Sarin (1) drew with Aydin Suleymanli (Aze, 1); Vidit Santosh Gujrathi (1) beat Abhijeet Gupta (0); Pouya Idani (Iri, 1) beat B Adhiban (0).

Women: Divya Deshmukh (1) lost to Tan Zhongyi (Chn, 2); Anna Muzychuk (Ukr, 2) beat Tsolakidou, Stavroula 91); Eline Roebers (Ned, 1.5) drew with R Vaishali (1.5); Antoaneta Stefanova (Bul, 2) beat B Savitha Shri (1); D Harika (1) drew with Hoang Thanh Trang (Hun, 1); Dinara Wagner (Ger, 1) drew with Tania Sachdev (1); Aulia Medina Warda (ina, 1) beat Vantika Agrawal (0).

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