Barua’s meets Khalifman in tie-breaker for place in 2nd round

The rules of the tie-breaking games are as follows: the first series of two games will be played at 25 minutes per player plus they get 10 seconds time increment automatically for each move they made. If required a second series of two games will be played at 15 minutes per player plus 10 seconds time increment. If the match is still tied a series of sudden-death games will be played.

The first player to win goes through. White starts with four minutes and black five minutes and both get 10 seconds time increment. If the match carries on too long in this mode (to be decided by the arbiter) then a single decisive game will be played. White receives six minutes and black five minutes without any incement. However, the player with black pieces will be declared winner in the event of a draw.

Khalifman opened with his queen’s pawn as the Indian had excellent results against the king-pawn opening. The Indian GM invited him to play the semi-Slav defence — Barua’s latest weapon. But the tall, bearded Russian side-stepped the semi-Slav and preferred the queen’s gambit orthodox defence. Barua managed to ease the pressure with a series of exchanges but was saddled with a weak pawn in the centre.

Thereafter the Russian dominated the proceedings. He came up with a gem of a plan to surround the weak black pawn. He brought all of his pieces to concentrate on the weakling. Barua had no way to defend the weakness. He lost the pawn on 29th move. Since he had a bishop against Khalifman’s knight, the Indian GM hoped for a draw.

However, the former Russian champion was in his elements today. He activated his pieces and systematically exchanged Barua’s queen and rooks. Thereafter Khalifman pushed his central pawns and soon Barua’s position became cramped against the moving mass of white pawns. Barua kept on fighting using the long ranging bishop for obstructing Khalifman’s plans.

Khalifman posted his knight centrally and controlled Barua’s bishop. When the Indian GM realised that he could not stop the white pawn from reaching its crowning glory. He resigned the game on 67th move. After losing a vital pawn on 29th move, the Indian had put up a tremendous battle but his heroic efforts had gone in vain against the technically superior Russian GM.

The youngest GM in the fray, Russian Ponomoriev defeated Al Modahiki to enter the second round. He will meet GM Vaselin Topolov of Bulgaria in the 2nd round.