Arjun seventh in Sharjah Masters, Iranian Daneshvar wins the trophy
Top seeded Grandmaster Erigaisi Arjun played out a draw with eventual winner Bardiya Daneshvar of Iran in the ninth and final round to finish in the top 10 at the Sharjah Masters International chess tournament here.
With a four-way tie at the top of the tables on 6.5 points each, Daneshvar pipped everyone to clinch his maiden title here with his best tiebreak score.
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Volodar Murzin of Russia ended second ahead of Sam Shankland of the United States, while Uzbek’s Shamsiddin Vakhidov had to be content with fourth place.
It was an eight-way tie for the fourth players and Arjun emerged as the only Indian finishing in the top ten on six points. For the records, the Indian ended with four wins, four draws and a lone loss in one of the strongest open in the world.
Leading the event solely after the sixth round on five points, GM Aravindh Chithambaram could only manage a half point in the last three to end in a tie for 13th spot alongside Indian counterparts Abhimanyu Puranik and P Iniyan.
Important and Indian results final round (Indians unless stated)
Sam Shankland (6.5) drew with Volodar Murzin (Fid, 6.5); Erigaisi Arjun (6) drew with Bardiya Daneshvar (Iri, 6.5); Aravindh Chithambaram (5.5) drew with Abhimanyu Puranik (5.5); Leon Luke Mendonca (5) lost to Ivan Zemlyanskii (Fid, 6); Abhimanyu Mishra (6) beat Sankalp Gupta (5); V Pranav (5) drew with Nihal Sarin (5); P Iniyan (5.5) beat Samvel Ter-Sahakyan (Arm, 4.5); Raunak Sadhwani (4.5) drew with Sanal Vahap (4.5); B Adhiban (4.5) drew with Daniil Yuffa (Fid. 4.5); Bharath Subramaniyam (3.5) lost to Nikolas Theodorou (Gre, 4.5); Abhijeet Gupta (4.5) beat David Gavrilescu (Rou, 3.5); Pranav Anand (4.5) beat Rinat Jumabayev (Kaz, 3.5); Eltaj Safarli (Aze, 4) drew with Raja Rithvik (4); S P Sethuraman (4.5) beat Cardoso Jose Gabriel (Esp, 3.5); Aditya Samant (4) beat Luca Moroni (Fra, 3).