Indian teams lose
at Chess Olympiad

The Chinese women's team moved into the lead, with 27 points, after a 1.5-1.5 draw with Ukraine in the 13th and penultimate round of the 35th Chess Olympiad at the Bled Sports hall in Slovenia on Saturday.

China have a half point lead over Georgia, who suffered their third defeat in row, losing to Bulgaria 1-2.

In the men's section, Russia continued to maintain their lead with 34.5 points and assured themselves of the gold medal following a 2-2 draw with Israel, while second-placed Hungary (34.5) drew with Armenia.

The Chinese men, too, made good progress and are in the third spot with 32.5 points after scoring a heavy 3-1 victory over Croatia.

It turned out to be a "Friday the 13th" for the Indian men and women's teams as they lost to Switzerland 1.5-2.5 and to United States 1-2 respectively.

Surya Sekhar Ganguly, who became India's eighth Grandmaster on Thursday and WGM Vijayalakshmi Subbaraman scored the only victories for India.

Ganguly, who faced the Sicilian Najdorf variation from Joseph Gallenger, displayed a better understanding of the resulting position and won a Rook for a Bishop on the 23rd move when Black went in tactics.

In an attempt to get counterplay, Gallager sacrificed a piece to bring white's King into the open and give perpetual checks.

Ganguly calmly played the right move and turned on the heat with his deft moves to win the game in 43 moves.

It was an interesting clash on the top board between Krishnan Sasikiran and 71-year old Grandmaster and former World championship challenger Victor Korchnoi.

Sasikiran, who faced the Nimzo-Indian defence from the veteran, had to go on the defence right after the opening stage when Black sacrificed a pawn for attacking opportunities.

Sasikaran took the Queens off the board to slow down Black's initiative but his structural weakness stayed behind and Korchnoi exploited those to checkmate his younger rival in 36 moves.

While Harikrishna was the first to complete the game, drawing in 32 moves with Black pieces against his higher rated opponent Yannick Pelletier, IM R B Ramesh slipped against Florian Jenni in the Siclian defence in 67 moves.

Ramesh, who had a good opening, had a rock solid defence set up, giving white no chances for an initiative. However, in a double rook and monor piece endgame he tried to gain the upper hand but only lost a pawn to give away the game eventually.

Vijalakshmi Subbaraman drew in 11 moves against Irina Krush to stay in contention for a medal on the top board. She requires a win in the final round match today against Israel to obtain the bronze for her performance on the first board.

Swati Ghate lost to Elena Donaldson with the black pieces in the Queen's Gambit accepted defence. Swati, who had to forgo an exchange on the 26th move in a Rook and minor pieces endgame, went down in 38 moves.

Arathie Ramaswamy came up with a 40-move draw yesterday with Camilla Baginskaite. Aarthie, who faced the Sicilian defence, advanced her Kingside pawns thematcally. However, black was upto the task and kept white's intentions at bay by actively posting her major pieces and dark squared Bishop. She had to repeat moves and take a draw.

Earlier in the day, a sculpture on "Pirc Defence", portraying the famous opening, was presented to Bled by its creator Janez Boljka to commemorate the 2002 Chess Olympiad.

This opening, known throughout the chess world as the "Pirc defence" was named after the Slovenian chess Grandmaster Vasja Pirc.

The sculpture of chess is with bronze figures stationed at the banks of the Bled Lake facing the Church of Sta Maria and the Bled castle on the hill top amidst the picturesque surroundings of lake gardens, rowing boats, running mini-bus trains and galloping horse driven coaches.

This strange opening with delayed support to the central squares was not a favourite in its initial stage. This defence was pioneered by Slovenian Vasja Pirc and fellow compatriots.

This hypermodern defence is based on counter-attack. Black encourages White to form a pawn center, which Black then attempts to undermine and annihilate.

Black plans to pressure d4 and the black squares in general.

However, later on, many super Grandmasters patronised this opening.

Immortalising this famous defence gainst 'e4' opening. Ljubljana (spelled Lubiyana), the capital city of Slovenia, now had the honour of introducing a chess tournament in memory of Vasja Peric, who passed away in 1980, and thereafter the municipality of Maribor had organised this tournament every year.

Earlier reports:
Round 12: Surya Shekhar Ganguly becomes Grandmaster
Round 11: India's medal hopes diminish
Round 10: England halt India's march
Round 9: Kunte strikes as India move to fifth position
Round 8: Sasikiran, Ganguly shine
Round 7: Thumping wins for Indian men and women
Round 6: Indian men win, women draw
Round 5: Bad day for India
Round 4: Indian teams back to winning ways
Round 3: Indian men falter against Russia
Round 2: India continue good showing at Chess Olympiad
Round 1: Indians off to a winning start at Chess Olympiad