Indians face an uphill task

Linares Spain, January 18: International Master R B Rameshacirc;euro;trade;s efforts to catch up with the leading pack received a set...

Linares Spain, January 18: International Master R B Rameshacirc;euro;trade;s efforts to catch up with the leading pack received a setback as he had to spilt the point after wriggling out of a dangerous position in the 10th round of the Linares International Open Chess Championship here.

Grandmaster Zurab Sturua stopped young GM Bacrotacirc;euro;trade;s winning run by holding him to a draw which put him on the joint lead on 7.5 points along with GMs S Sulskis, Z Zhang and G Kacheishvilli.

K Visveswaran, Sriram Jha and Aarthie Ramaswamy provided some consolation for India by winning their boards and garnering useful points.

Overnight winner Sandipan Chanda 2431, also on 5.5 points as Ramesh, continued with his good form to earn a creditable draw against higher-rated GM Arencibia 2513 from Cuba. Ramesh 2467 faced some anxious moments against IM Pilgaard 2334 of Denmark before agreeing for a truce. Dinesh Kumar Sharma 2355 let young IM Paraguay 2412 of the Philippines escape with a draw from the black side of the centre gambit opening after enjoying a pawn advantage right from the beginning.

Paraguay created lot of confusion for the lost pawn and the players entered a rook and bishop ending with Sharma enjoying a slight advantage but that was not sufficient and the players agreed to split the point.

IM Estremera Panos 2372 of Spain beat Rahul Shetty 2325 from the white side of the queens gambit exchange variation. IM Vasilev of Bulgaria played for a draw and got it against Chandrasekhar Gokhale 2326 from the white side of the queen pawn opening.

Important results: GM Z Sturua 7.5 drew with GM Ebacrot 7.5, GM S Sulskis 7.5 drew with GM Z Zhang 7.5, GM M Kobalija 7 lost to GM G Kacheishvilli 7.5, IM Sandipan Chanda 5.5 drew with GM Walter Arencibia 5.5, IM R B Ramesh 5.5 drew with IM K Pilgaard 5.5, M Paraguay 5 drew with D K Sharma 5, Perez Candelario 4 lost to K Visweswaran 5, A Potapenko 4 lost to Sriram Jha 4.5, R Aarthie 4.5 bt S Galochkin 3.5, M Vasilev 4.5 drew with C S Gokhale 4.5, Estremera Panos 5 bt Rahul Shetty 4.