Krutika Nadiq pulls off
spectacular win
Showing glimpses of her talent, India's Krutika Nadiq pulled off a spectacular victory
against formidable Yang Shen of China in the fourth round to take the lead in the under-14 girls' section in the World Youth chess championship, in Heraklion (Greece), on Monday.
On a good day for Indian players, when as many as 17
out of 28 registered victories, Parimarjan Negi maintained his
winning run in the under-10 boys' section, comprehensively
beating Ivekovic Zvonmir of Croatia.
In the same category, Y Sandeep also emerged victorious
brushing aside the challenge of Poland's Zbijniew Strzemiecki
with white pieces.
Grandmaster Pendyala Harikrishna's hopes of becoming the sole
leader in the under-18 boys' section suffered a setback when
he failed to beat the lower-ranked opponent Lopez Silva of
Chile in a fourth round match.
Playing a safe game from the beginning, Lopez gave little
chance to his famed opponent and managed a draw after the
Indian made a technical skirmish of Sicilian Sveshnikov with
black pieces.
The day belonged to Pune-based Krutika who put up a
brilliant performance to beat last year's Under-12 champion
Shen. Playing white, Krutika employed a dangerous pawn
sacrifice variation in the initial phase of a Ruy Lopez
defence.
Shen had little clue about on-board happenings as the
Indian slowly regained her pawn and maintained a superior
position right till the end.
Unable to hold on, the Chinese girl finally succumbed to
the enormous pressure around her king and entered a lost king
and pawn endgame where the Indian made no mistakes to pocket
full points.
Asian juinor champion Tania Sachdev also put up a good
show to beat Maria de Plazaola of Argentina in the Under-16
(girls) category. Seeded 11th, Tania on 3.5 points moved to
sole lead with this win.
In the under-10 girls' section, Asian champion P Lakshmi Sahiti
defeated Wing-Yan Yuen of France with black pieces and took
her tally to 3.5 points. M Manogna of India drew her second
straight game to finish the round with 3 points.
Former world under-12 champion Deep Sengupta came back
into the reckoning with a hard-fought victory against Mezhlumyan
Yahram of Armenia with black pieces in the Under-14 boys
category.
K Nikhilesh Kumar is leading this category amongst
Indians with 3.5 points while Sengupta moved to three with
the victory against Yahram.