Chennai Grandmasters 2024, Day 5: Levon Aronian secures solitary win in Masters section; Erigaisi continues to lead

Levon Aronian (US) secured the only win of the day in the Masters section, as he beat Frenchman Maxime Vachier-Lagrave in the fifth round of the second edition of the Chennai Grandmasters classical chess tournament at the Anna Centenary Library auditorium here on Saturday.

“I think it was a good game. Maybe, I didn’t play precisely early on. But then, from the position that I got I think I played good moves,” said Aronian after the win.

“It wasn’t good. I made a very big mistake and it was very difficult to defend,” said Vachier-Lagrave.

Serbia’s Alexey Sarana, who drew with Aravindh Chithambaram, said he had an off day.

“I was a bit tired today. I didn’t play a very convincing game. I wasn’t better at any moment in this game and was just worse,” said Sarana.

Top Indians Arjun Erigaisi and Vidit Gujrathi drew with Iranians Parham Maghsoodloo and Amin Tabatabaei.

In the Challengers section, V. Pranav’s four-game winning streak ended as he drew with Raunak Sadhwani.

R. Vaishali too drew with D. Harika. “After a point, we couldn’t find a way to improve and repeated the moves. But I think at some point, I was better,” said Vaishali.

On her overall performance so far, she said: “It could’ve been much better. I’m not very happy with the way I’ve played.”

Only Karthikeyan Murali emerged victorious, versus Abhimanyu Puranik, on the day.

Arjun Erigaisi (4) in the Masters and V. Pranav (4.5) in the Challengers continue to be in the sole lead.

The results (fifth round, Indians unless mentioned):

Masters: Vidit Gujrathi (1.5) drew with Amin Tabatabaei (Irn, 3); Levon Aronian (US, 3.5) bt Maxime Vachier-Lagrave (Fra, 2); Alexey Sarana (Ser, 1.5) drew with Aravindh Chithambaram (2.5); Arjun Erigaisi drew (4) with Parham Maghsoodloo (Irn, 2).

Challengers: M. Pranesh (2.5) drew with Leon Luke Mendonca (3.5); V. Pranav (4.5) drew with Raunak Sadhwani (3); D. Harika (1) drew with R. Vaishali (1); Abhimanyu Puranik (2) lost to Karthikeyan Murali (2.5).