Ramesh in joint lead at Biel

International Master R B Ramesh played a draw with IM Arizmendi Martinez of Spain to stay in joint lead with his opponent after the sixth round of the Masters section in the Biel International Open Chess tournament in Switzerland.

GM Mihail Kobalija of Russia joined the two leaders in lead on five points with a thumping victory over FIDE master Zollbrecht Josef of Germany.

It was a cautious day for the Indian contingent as only IM P Konguvel managed to win his game with the others drawing after intense fights.

Konguvel, alongwith GM Abhijit Kunte and IM D V Prasad, is on four points.

Playing white, Ramesh was unfortunate not to win after nearly outplaying Arizmendi in all departments of the game. The opening featured established manoeuvres of the Sicilian Sveshnikov defence and Ramesh out-prepared his opponent in the early phase itself.

The middlegame commenced with Ramesh holding the cushion of an extra pawn and pieces started fleeing the board in tandem. The players eventually arrived at a queen and pawns endgame having promoted their second queens where Ramesh had two pawns against the lone king.

The Indian's victory was never in doubt but for a faux pas he committed in the crucial and final moment. The result was consistent checks on his king and whenever Ramesh managed to wriggle out of the checks, the pawn promotion was made difficult.

The game lasted 77 moves before Ramesh proposed the draw.

In the next round Ramesh will take on Kobalija with white pieces.

Kunte drew with veteran Swiss GM Ivan Nemet in his favourite Queen's Indian defence opening with black pieces.

Cautious moves by Nemet did not allow Kunte to gain any ground in the complexities and the pieces got exchanged at regular intervals.

To seize the initiative, Kunte surrendered the bishop pair but his knight did not get much space in the ensuing minor piece endgame. The draw was agreed to in 43 moves.

Prasad did not get much against the Sicilian defence of IM Gennadi Fish of Ukraine. It was a dynamic middlegame and Fish gradually improved his position in the Scheveningen set up.

The queens got traded on the 24th move and to get maximum mobility for his rooks, Fish sacrificed a pawn.

In the end, Prasad had to part with his extra material and he steered the game to a peace result after 44 moves.

Konguvel made mincemeat of Lichman Petr of Ukraine in the Grunfeld Indian defence game with black pieces. Lichman was caught off guard in one of the popular variations where Konguvel voluntarily opted out of castling and walked his king over to the king side.

In trying to initiate an attack against the king, Lichman left his pawns vulnerable and Konguvel capitalised on the mistake to transpose the game into the ending with a handy extra pawn. Lichman called it a day after 41 moves.

Double Woman Grandmaster norm holder Aarthie Ramaswamy's prospectes suffered as she drew with Swiss Leutwyler Martin to be left with 2.5 points from six outings.