Jha opens Indian campaign with an upset win

But it was Jha who took all the attention as he beat sixth seeded GM Oleg Korneev (2600) of Russia with Black pieces.

Sriram employed the Sicilian Pelikan variation which he rarely plays and sacrificed a pawn in the opening for better development of the pieces. Korneev clung on to the pawn and allowed Sriram to initiate a wonderful piece sacrifice on the fg3 square.

Sriram then gave another pawn as clearance sacrifice and won back the piece while Korneev’s king was still in the mating net. Korneev was about to lose his queen or get mated when he decided to give up on the 27th move.

IM Ramesh (2467), playing with White pieces against partially-blind Draghici (2128) of Spain, got a slight advantage from the opening in a Sicilian Richter Rauzer game.

The game went into long ending where Ramesh showed enough patience to win a pawn and the game in 59 moves.

Chanda (2431) survived a scare and managed to squeeze a win in a drawish ending against unrated Dioz Luque of Spain. Chanda completely mishandled the white side of the Sicilian Pelikan variation and allowed Dioz to equalise easily.

Chanda then went into an equal ending and slowly put pressure on his opponent with his advanced king. Dioz made some mistakes and allowed Chanda to transpose the game into a better knight versus bad bishop ending where Chanda won.

Sharma (2353) held GM Bogdan Lalic (2531) to a creditable draw to make it a good beginning for India in the event. Sharma started with the queens gambit declined variation and later transposed into a Dutch stonewall setup.

Most of the pieces were exchanged at regular intervals and the experienced GM offered a draw on the 37th move which Sharma accepted.

Gokhale (2326) brought more cheer to the Indian camp when he held GM Sulskis (2501) of Lithuania to a draw. Gokhale faced an irregular opening from the Grandmaster but kept his cool to obtain a slightly better position from the opening.

Sulskis sensed danger and gave an exchange sacrifice to give perpetual check to Gokhale’s king and draw the game in 38 moves.

Visweswaran (2289) lost to R Perez (2492) of Cuba in a Sicilian Najdorf variation with Black pieces. Visweswaran misplayed in the opening and gave a clear advantage to Perez. He then maneuvered his rook to the fc5 square to create some counter-play but overlooked a simple tactic from his opponent to get into the mating net and lose the game in 20 moves.

IWM Aarthie (2250) faced the Sicilian Richter Rauzer from the black side against IM Meijers (2483) of Germany. Aarthie allowed her opponent to launch a big attack on her king after the players castled on the same side.

Aarthie couldn’t counter Meijers’ threats on her king and blundered a piece to a tactic in an already difficult position.

IM-elect Shetty began the campaign with a loss against IM Comas Fabrego (2508) with the black pieces of queen’s Indian Defence.

Shetty obtained an equal position but in the ending he played some bad moves to lose a pawn and allow the opponent king to advance into his territory. In sudden-death time control, Shetty gave up on the 61st move.

Important results
J Ivanov (0) lost to Vladimir Akopian (1); K Sakaev (0.5) drew with I Yugopov (0.5); O Korneev (0) lost to Sriram Jha (1); Bogdan Lalic (0.5) drew with D K Sharma (0.5); C S Gokhale (0.5) drew with Suranas Sulkis (0.5); R B Ramesh (1) bt G Draghici (1); Sandipan Chanda (1) bt Diaz Luque (0); L Comas Fabrego bt Rahul Shetty (0); Aarthie Ramaswamy (0) lost to IM Meijurs (1); Rodriguez perez (1) bt K Visweswaran (0).