Indian teams continued their winning streak by registering easy wins over their respective opponents in the open section of the 44th Chess Olympiad here on Sunday.
Second seed India ‘A’ beat GM P Harikrishna and Arjun Arigasi for a 3-1 win against Greece, India ‘B’ beat Switzerland 4-0 and third team beat Iceland 3-1 defeated by ,
Vidit S Gujrathi, playing in the second board for India A, settled for a draw against GM Nikolaos Theodoro, while K Shashikiran held on to Evgenios Ioannidis.
Speaking after defeating Dimitrios Mastrovasilis, Harikrishna said that his opponent put up good resistance and in the end, he got a good combination of moves.
It is up to the pair to meet another Indian team. Our focus is on playing the match and not the teams.”
With the Indian teams performing well so far, they can take on each other in the competition.
The top-seeded Americans stamped their authority with a 3-1 win over 24th seed Georgia. Although Fabiano Caruana and Linear Dominiguez Pérez could not register a win, Lev Aronian and Sam Shakland finished the job by defeating Mikhail McDlishvili and Tamaz Galashvili respectively.
In the women’s section, three Indian teams emerged victorious for the third consecutive day. The ‘A’ team rested top player Koneru Humpy, but courtesy R Vaishali and Bhakti Kulkarni, they won 3-1 against England.
Dronavalli Harika was fielded for the first time in this Olympiad and this is the ninth time in a row that she is playing for India, not to mention the two Virtual Olympiads where India won gold and bronze medals in the mixed edition.
Harika, 31, is in the final stages of her first pregnancy and was pitted against England’s Jovanka Hauska. She could not force a win on the top board.
The ‘B’ team registered a 3-1 win against Indonesia with Vantika Agarwal and Soumya Swaminathan defeating Irene Kharisma Sukander and Fariha Mariroh respectively. Padmini Raut and Mary Ann Gomes had to be content with draws against their opponents.
The third hosts registered a 2.5-1.5 win against Austria thanks to victories from PV Nandidha and Pratyusha Bodda. Varshini Sahiti lost to Nikola Merhuber and Isha Karavade drew against Katharina Nurkla.
WGM Nandidha was the first to score a point, courtesy a walkover against Chiara Polterauer, who was unwell.
This is my first Olympiad and I am playing in my hometown Chennai, which is enough to give me extra energy. Rating and seeding don’t matter in my opinion. Even our team has a chance and we are ready to give our best.”
In other results, 28th-ranked Mongolia won the women’s event 3–1 over seventh-seeded United States, while number 2 seeded Ukraine beat Slovakia 4–0.
Indian match results:
Open: India ‘A’ beat Greece 3-1 (P Harikrishna beats Dimitrios Mastrovasilis, Vidit Gujrathi draws with Nikolaos Theodoro, Arjun Arigasi beats Athanasios Mastovasilis, K Sasikiran draws with Evgenius Ioannidis ).
India ‘B’ beat Switzerland 4-0 (D Gukesh beat Nico Georgiadis,
Nihal Sarin defeated Sebastian Bogner, R Pragyanand defeated Yannick Pelletier, Raunak Sadhwani defeated Fabian Benziger).
India ‘C’ beat Iceland 3-1 (Surya Shekhar Ganguly draws with Greterson Hjorvar Stein, SP Sethuraman beat Hans Stefansson, Abhijit Gupta beat Gumundur Kjartsson, Abhimanyu Puranik draws with Greterson Helgi ).
Women: India beat England 3-1 (D Harika with Jovanka Hauska, R Vaishali beat Toma Katarjanya, Tania Sachdev defeated Yao Lan, Bhakti Kulkarni defeated Akshay Kalayalahan).
India ‘B’ beat Indonesia 3-1 (Vantika Agarwal beat Irene Kharisma Sukander, Padmini Raut drew with Auliya Medina Varda, Soumya Swaminathan beat Fariha Mariroh, Mary Ann Gomes beat Anastasia Citra Davey Ardhiyani. drawn with).
India ‘C’ beat Austria 2.5-1.5 (Isha Karavade drew with Katharina Nurkia, PV Nandidha defeated Chiara Poltrauder, M Varshini Sahiti lost to Nikola Merhuber, Pratyusha Bodda defeated Hapala Elizabeth).
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