The Hindu : Sport : Diwakar gets the better of Humpy, jumps to joint third position

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Apr 14, 2006

Sport

Sport

Diwakar gets the better of Humpy, jumps to joint third position

V.V. Subrahmanyam

Deepan misses a golden opportunity but continues to lead; impressive win for Harika

HIGHLY INNOVATIVE: Diwakar Prasad Singh surprised Koneru Humpy in their 14th round game. — Photo: K.R. Deepak

VISAKHAPATNAM: Diwakar Prasad Singh (Elo 2395) was the hero of the day, as he shocked women's World No. 2 Koneru Humpy (Elo 2548) in a 14th round game of the 43rd National `A' men's chess championship at the Swarna Bharathi Indoor Stadium here on Thursday.

Diwakar, who has been dubbed the `Dhoni of Indian chess' for his innovative style and high level of consistency like his Jharkhand mate Mahendra Singh Dhoni, recovered remarkably well after the surprise loss to P.D.S. Girinath on Wednesday.

The 22-year-old Tata Steel contract employee outplayed Humpy in Nimzo Indian Defence to climb to the joint third spot with 9.5 points behind sole leader J. Deepan Chakravarthy (10.5) and defending champion Surya Sekhar Ganguly (10).

Earlier, Ganguly settled for a 10-move draw with GM Sandipan Chanda. Humpy is also in the third spot.

Clever play

In the Diwakar-Humpy game, initially the position looked better for the latter, but with clever moves Diwakar equalised in the middle-game.

"Once she played Nb6, which I felt was a passive move, I think I gained control of the game,'' he said later. Playing only for the second time against Humpy, Diwakar marshalled his forces well to lure her into an end-game where she could do little and had to resign.

GM-elect Deepan frittered away a winning advantage against Arghyadip Das in a Sicilian Classical Variation. Once he faltered by playing f6, Deepan followed it up with a few more moves that saw him slip into a minus. "Perhaps, f5 could have been a winning move for him,'' said Arghyadip, quite delighted after salvaging a draw in a rook-ending.

GM Abhijit Kunte moved back into contention with a 43-move win against B.S. Sivanandan in King's Indian Defence. With a strong knight against Sivanandan's bishop, Kunte clinched the issue by giving a check with his Qg6 and his opponent resigned with a clear mating threat lurking around.

Ghate ahead

In a women's 13th round game, WGM Dronavalli Harika registered an impressive win against Swati Mohota in Slav Defence.

WGM Swathi Ghate continued to be the sole leader with 9.5 points after outplaying Supriya Maji in Scotch Variation in 51 moves. Supriya sacrificed a pawn in the opening, but Swathi gained two more pawns in a rook-ending to record a win.

The results: Men (14th round): Diwakar Prasad Singh (9.5) bt Koneru Humpy (9.5); Abhijit Kunte (8.5) bt B.S. Sivanandan (5); Sundarrajan Kidambi (7.5) lost to M.R. Venkatesh (9); Abhijeet Gupta (6) drew with Sriram Jha (3.5); Himanshu Sharma (4.5) bt M.S. Thejkumar (5); Surya Sekhar Ganguly (10) drew with Sandipan Chanda (8); Lanka Ravi (5) drew with Dinesh K. Sharma (4); Saptarshi Roy Chowdhury (7) drew with R.B. Ramesh (6); Arghyadip Das (5.5) drew with J. Deepan Chakravarthy (10.5); P.D.S. Girinath (5.5) drew with Vikramaditya Kamble (4.5) and S. Arun Prasad (6) bye.

Women (13th round): Supriya Maji (5) lost to Swathi Ghate (9.5); Aarthie Ramaswmy (7) bt J.E. Kavitha (5); S. Vijayalakshmi (8.5) bt Kiran Monisha Mohanty (6); S. Meenakshi (8.5) bt Soumya Swaminathan (3); Dronavalli Harika (8) bt Swati Mohota (4.5); Nisha Mohota (7.5) bt I. Ramyakrishna (5); Mary Ann Gomes (9) bt Nimmy A. George (6.5); Eesha Karvade (7) bt Ishwarya Shobana (5) and Amruta Mokal (5) bt Alka Das (3.5).

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