Forgettable day for Indians
in Czech Open chess

Sandipan Chanda and Surya Shekhar Ganguly face a daunting task in their quest for a final Grandmaster norm after drawing their sixth round games, against the Latvian duo of GM Daniels Friedman and International Master Arturs Nieksans, in the Czech Open Grandmaster chess tournament in Pardubice on Thursday.

On what turned out to be a forgettable day for the Indians playing on top boards, GM Vladislav Borovikov, 30, of Ukraine, regained sole lead with a remarkable victory over GM Stocek Jiri of the Czech Republic from the white side of a queen's Indian defence in 63 moves.

Borovikov now has 5.5 points in his kitty and is followed by GMs Hracek Zbynek, Petr Haba, Valery Neverov, Dimitry Jakovenko and Davit Arutunian.

A wolf pack of 29 players are in joint third position, including top seed GMs Krishnan Sasikiran, Pendyala Harikrishna, Ganguly and Chanda -- all on 4.5 points each.

Chanda and Ganguly will have to score at least 2.5 points more from the remaining three rounds to earn their final Grandmaster norms.

Playing with white pieces on the second board, Sasikiran was surprised early in the opening by GM Alexander Moroz of Ukraine as the latter employed one of the old variations of the Queen's Gambit declined.

Sasikiran tried to break on the queen side but did not get the desireable advantage he was looking for, and after the 27th move signed the peace treaty.

Like Sikiran, Chanda too failed to take advantage of playing white.

Against the Tarrasch defence by transposition opted for by Friedmans, Chanda went for the central pawn breakthrough early in the opening. And just when he sensed a semblance of advantage, the Latvian went for the exchange of all the minor pieces that brought the game to a level heavy pieces endgame.

Harikrishna drew with IM Mathias Womacka of Germany with black pieces. The opening featured established manoeuvres of the Tarrasch variation until late into the middlegame when Mathias realised there was not much to hope for in the complexities that arose after his combinative play. The game lasted 41 moves.

Playing white, Ganguly's Glek variation did not turn out to be as good this time as Arturs equalised albeit with some difficulties.

Going for the attack on the king side, the Indian guided his pieces quite well but the strategy simplid not work. Arturs exchanged the queens on the 23rd move and the truce was agreed to after four more moves.

Former National champion GM Abhijit Kunte, white, went down fighting against Jakovenko from a Sicilian Scheveningen defence game.

An exponent of the opening from the black side, Kunte miscalculated his chances in the ensuing middlegame and allowed black's queen to penetrate in his camp decisively.

Once on top Jakovenko handled the position effectively to coast to victory after 40 moves.