Grandmaster Abhijeet Gupta kept himself in contention after he settled for a draw with Yuriy Kuzubov of Ukraine in the seventh round of 16th Dubai International open chess tournament here on Monday.
It turned out to be a tough day for the highest rated Indian here as Kuzubov was on top for the major part of the game and the draw was achieved only through a reckless repetition of position by the Ukrainian. The lead position remained unchanged as Romain Edouard of France settled for a quick draw with Sebastian Bogner of Switzerland at the top of the table.
The draw took the French GM to six points out of a possible seven and he stays half-a-point clear of Gupta, Bogner and Anuar Ismagembetov of Kazakhstan who made merry at the expense of Viorel Iordachescu of Moldova. While Edouard remains a favourite for the title, Gupta is still in with a chance if he can use his white effectively against Bogner in the penultimate round. Just two rounds remain in the $50,000 prize money event.
Important results: Seventh round: Sebastian Bogner (Sui, 5.5) drew with Romain Edouard (Fra, 6); Yuriy Kuzubov (Ukr, 5) drew with Abhijeet Gupta (5.5); Viorel Iordachescu (Mda, 4.5) lost to Anuar Ismagambetov (Kaz, 5.5); Diptayan Ghosh (4) lost to Gawain Jones (Eng, 5); Debashis Das (4) lost to Amin Bassem (Egy, 5); M. Shyam Sundar (4.5) drew with Solak Dragan (Tur, 4.5); Sahaj Grover (4.5) drew with Mikheil Mchedlishvili (Geo,4.5); Ashwin Jayaram (4.5) drew with Sergey Volkov (Rus, 4.5); Pavel Kotsur (Kaz, 5) bt Abhishek Kelkar (4).
V. Karthik (4.5) drew with Slavko Cicak (Swe, 4.5); Kazim Gulamali (USA, 3.5) lost to M.R. Lalith Babu (4.5); Sayantan Das (4.5) bt Marina Makropoulou (Gre, 3.5); Siva Mahadevan (4.5) lost to S. Ravi Teja (3.5); Athanasios Mastrovasilis (Gre, 4) bt Nishant Malhotra (3.5); Swapnil Dhopade (4) bt Frederik Fries (Ger, 3); Samir Nadir (Sud, 3) lost to C.R.G. Krishna (4); Mohannad Farhan (Jor, 4) bt Nimmy George (3); Aniruddha Deshpande (4) bt Abo-Hazeem Mohanned (Jor, 3); Harshal Shahi (4) bt Vita Kryvoruchko (Ukr, 3); Mahmoud Haitham (Sud, 3) lost to Ivana Maria Furtado (4); Ahmed Elgantiry (Egy, 2.5) lost to Prince Bajaj (3.5); Harikrishnan Samyuktha (2.5) lost to Martin Lokander (Swe, 3.5); Pratyusha Bodda (3.5) bt Asmar Elie (Lib, 2.5); Akshay Halagannavar (2.5) bt Nandu Gagarin (1.5).
