Harikrishna held, loses lead

Grandmaster Pendyala Harikrishna slipped to second position in the Montreal International Chess tournament after drawing his sixth round game against Polish Grandmaster Kamil Miton.

Grandmaster Sergei Tiviakov surged into the lead by beating local star Mark Bluvshtein with the black pieces.

Overnight leaders Vassily Ivanchuk and Gata Kamsky, who shared pole position with Harikrishna after five rounds, were also pushed to joint-second spot, with four points, after splitting the point with Pavel Eljanov and Emil Sutovsky respectively.

Meanwhile, British Grandmaster Nigel Short's woes continued as he went down to Canadian GM Pascal Charbonneau for his fifth loss in six rounds.

Harikrishna played the solid Slav defence against Miton and reached a balanced position after the opening. He allowed his kingside pawn structure to be damaged but obtained the better bishop in the process.

There was only one open file on the board which made the exchange of heavy pieces inevitable and the players agreed to a draw in a simplified position on the 20th move.

Tiviakov, on the other hand, scored a tactical victory over Mark Bluvshtein and shot into the lead with 4.5 points to his credit.

Playing the black pieces against the Catalan opening, Tiviakov, made his aggressive intentions clear in the opening by advancing his queenside pawns. Bluvshtein replied with solid play and the position remained level for the first twenty moves.

Tiviakov started a tactical sequence on the 21st move which suddenly made the position very sharp and it was Bluvshtein's blunders on the 27th and 29th moves which cost him a piece and prompted his immediate resignation.

Ivanchuk played the Grunfeld defense against Eljanov and a closed position was reached. Both players manoeuvred their pieces around without taking the risk of opening up the position. There was little progress to be made with such a strategy and the players agreed to split the point on the 30th move in a balanced position.

The game between Kamsky and Sutovsky started off with the sharp Sicilian defence. The players castled on opposite wings, creating chances of attack and counter attack. However, the exchange of queens on the 14th move put an end to such thrilling prospects and the players agreed to a draw in a level endgame.

Results (Round 6): Mark Bluvshtein (Can, 2.5) lost to Sergei Tiviakov (Ned, 4.5); Kamil Miton (Pol, 2.5) drew with P Harikrishna (Ind, 4.0); Pavel Eljanov (Ukr,3.5) drew Vassily Ivanchuk (Ukr, 4.0);Gata Kamsky(USA, 4.0) drew Emil Sutovsky (Isr, 2.0); Pascal Charbonneau (Can, 1.5) beat Nigel Short (Eng, 0.5).

The moves (Miton - Harikrishna):

1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.Nf3 dxc4 5.a4 Bf5 6.e3 e6 7.Bxc4 Bb4 8.00 Nbd7 9.Qe2 00 10.e4 Bg6 11.Bd3 h6 12.Bf4 a6 13.h3 Re8 14.e5 Nd5 15.Nxd5 cxd5 16.Bxg6 fxg6 17.Qd3 Nf8 18.Rfc1 Rc8 19.Rxc8 Qxc8 20.Rc1. Draw agreed.