Dubai Open chess: Gupta, Negi in joint lead

Grandmaster and defending champion Abhijeet Gupta showcased his positional acumen to outwit Grandmaster Amin Bassem of Egypt in the sixth round of 14th Dubai International Open chess tournament in Dubai.

With the victory, Gupta took his tally to five points and jumped into joint lead along with compatriots Parimarjan Negi, Sandipan Chanda, Ni Hua of China, Vladimir Akopian of Armenia Evgenij Miroshnichenko of Ukraine and Normunds Miezis of Latvia.

In another exceptional effort, Negi beat Levan Pantsulaia of Georgia while Chanda scored over compatriot Surya Shekhar Ganguly to remain in contention for a podium finish.

With just three rounds to go in one of the strongest open tournaments held in Asia, Vishnu Prasanna came within striking distance of his GM norm after beating Russian GM Alexander Evdokimov. Prasanna, S Nitin, M R Lalith Babu and P Shyam Nikil are amongst those on 4.5 points sharing the eighth spot.

Along with Prasanna, S Nitin was also quite impressive in defeating GM Alexander Kovchan of Ukraine and his GM norm chances depend on the oppositions he face in last three rounds.

Eleven-year old Kritik Satija came up with a fine performance to beat International Woman Master Maria Blanco Acevedo of Venezuela who played black. Satija is rated more than 500 points below the titled Venezuelan.

Important and Indian results of Round 6 (Indians unless stated): Ni Hua (Chn, 5) drew with Vladimir Akopian (Arm, 5); Abhijeet Gupta (5) beat Amin Bassem (Egy, 4); Levan Pantsulaia (Geo,  4) lost to Parimarjan Negi (5); Sandipan Chanda (5) beat Surya Shekhar Ganguly (4); Zhou Weiqi (Chn, 4) lost to Normunds Miezis (Lat, 5); G N Gopal (4.5) drew with Mikheil Mchedlishvili (Geo, 4.5); Yusup Atabayev (Tkm, 4) lost to Evgenij Miroshnichenko (Ukr, 5); M Shyam Sundar (3.5) lost to Sergey Volkov (Rus, 4.5); S Nitin (4.5) beat Alexander Kovchan (Ukr, 3.5); Alexander Evdokimov (Rus, 3.5) lost to Vishnu Prasanna (4.5); M R Lalith Babu (4.5) beat Saptarshi Roy Chowdhury (3.5); Ankit Rajpara (4) drew with Sahaj Grover (4); Ebrahim Ahmadinia (Iri, 3.5) lost to P Shyam Nikil (4.5); Sayantan Das (3) lost to Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu (Rou, 4); Georgy Timoshenko (Ukr, 4) beat Anup Deshmukh (3); Alexander Raetsky (Rus, 3.5) drew with Antonio Viani D'cunha (3.5); Swapnil Dhopade (4) beat N Surendran (3); Somoff Abdo (Lib, 3) lost to Akshayraj Kore (4); Tania Sachdev (4) beat Abdumalik Zhansaya (Kaz, 3); Ayyad Maher (Brn, 3.5) drew with N Srinath(3.5); Ramnath Bhuvanesh (4) beat Ahmed Abuzied (Sud, 3); Abedi Ali (Iri, 2.5) lost to M Karthikeyan (3.5); Grigor Dilanyan (Arm, 2.5) lost to Madhurima Shekhar (3.5); P V Nandhidhaa (3) beat Niklesh Jain (2); M Vigram (3) Nadir Samir (Sud, 2); Kritik Satija (3) beat Maria Blanco Acevedo (Ven, 2); Harshal Shahi (2) drew with Antonio Molina (Phi, 2); Salah Romany (Egy,  1.5) lost to U Ashwini (2.5); Tamra Attallah(Ple, 2.5) beat Anshuman Singh (1.5); P Ambareesh (1) lost to Rafee Mohd Hayel (Syr, 2); Al-Mallahi Dawood (Uae, 1) lost to Sasikumar Anusweud (2).