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Soumya stuns Tania

Kamesh Srinivasan

NEW DELHI: Soumya Swaminathan surprised defending champion Tania Sachdev with her clean calculation under time-pressure to emerge as the leader after two rounds of the Parsvnath 35th National ‘A’ women’s chess championship at the Russian Centre of Science and Culture here on Friday.

On a day when former champions Swati Ghate and Nisha Mohota suffered unexpected defeats at the hands of unfancied Amrutha Mokal and Kiran Manisha Mohanty respectively, Pon N. Krithika defended in a gutsy fashion before pinning down Kruttika Nadig.

Up a bishop

After going up a bishop for two pawns, Soumya was able to exert considerable pressure on Tania’s king by accurately mobilising her resources. Tania conceded after 52 moves.

“Both of us were under time pressure. I was able to capitalise on being a piece up. I think that she misplayed the Benoni opening. I had the confidence to execute the finish,” said Soumya.

In another lively encounter, Swati was so focused on aligning her attack against Amrutha Mokal’s king that she left her own king vulnerable.

The unheralded Amrutha with an Elo rating of 2163 had the measure of the WGM with a rating of 2320 rating, as she hounded her with the queen and two rooks.

Blunder

Swati blundered a king move, in trying to put pressure on Amrutha whose time was running out on the clock, to endure the ignominy of being check-mated in 35 moves.

“I really enjoyed playing the game. I could have played better. It was very complicated, but the middle game panned out nice for me.

“After the pawn storm, I was in charge,” said Amrutha who ironically had 35 seconds on her clock to the 18 minutes for Swati.

Krithika took the second position on the table with 1.5 points.

The 16-year-old conceded that her opponent had blundered in moving her knight back that resulted in the bishop getting trapped in enemy territory.

The results (second round): Amrutha Mokal 1 bt Swati Ghate 1; Padmini Rout 1 drew with Bhakti Kulkarni 0.5; Kruttika Nadig 1 lost to Pon N. Krithika 1.5; Nisha Mohota 0.5 lost to Kiran Manisha Mohanty 1; Mary Ann Gomes 0.5 drew with Eesha Karavade 1; Tania Sachdev 1 lost to Soumya Swaminathan 2.

Third round pairings: Soumya-Amrutha; Eesha-Tania; Kiran-Mary; Krithika-Nisha; Bhakti-Kruttika; Swati-Padmini.

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