Grandmaster Marat Dzhumaev of Uzbekistan won his final game to ensure the title in the Rose Valley fifth Kolkata Open Grandmasters’ chess here at the Gorky Sadan on Thursday.
Dzhumaev’s win clipped the title hopes of young Indian GM and overnight leader S.P. Sethuraman, who played a draw on the top board and had to be content with the second position.
Tie-break system
Both the players were tied on eight points at the end of 11 rounds before the Buchholz tie-break system gave the Uzbekistan player his first international title in many years.
The tournament, which is claimed to be the highest rated chess event in Asia, saw some good performances from a handful of young Indians, most of whom finished in the top-10 of the final rankings.
While 19-year-old Sethuraman, the former under-16 world champion, was the best among the Indians, IM Vidit Santosh Gujrathi, who ensured his GM title, claimed the third position with 7.5 points.
Grandmaster Deep Sengupta, IM Swapnil Dhopade and GM Surya Sekhar Ganguly claimed the fifth, seventh and ninth positions with 7.5 points each.
The results:
Final round: S.P. Sethuraman 8 drew with Anton Korobov (Ukr) 7.5, Vidit Santosh Gujrathi 7.5 drew with Ni Hua (Chn) 7.5,
Swapnil S. Dhopade 7.5 drew with Deep Sengupta 7.5, V. Vishnu Prasanna 7 lost to Marat Dzhumaev (Uzb) 8,
Radoslaw Wojtaszek (Pol) 7.5 bt Viorel Iordachescu (Mda) 6.5, Dimakiling Oliver (Phi) 6.5 lost to Tiviakov Sergei (Ned) 7.5, Surya Shekhar Ganguly 7.5 bt Adly Ahmed (Egy) 6.5,
Abhijit Kunte 7 bt Abhijeet Gupta 6, Alberto David (Ita) 7 bt Alexander Fominyh (Rus) 6, G.A. Stany 6 lost to Mikhailo Oleksienko (Ukr) 7.
Top-10 positions: 1. Marat Dzhumaev (Uzb) 8 (BH – 70.5), 2. S.P. Sethuraman 8 (66.5),
3. Vidit Santosh Gujrathi 7.5 (69), 4. Radoslaw Wojtaszek (Pol) 7.5, 5. Deep Sengupta 7.5 (67, 62),
6. Anton Korobov (Ukr) 7.5 (67, 61), 7. Swapnil Dhopade 7.5 (66.5), 8. Ni Hua (Chn) 7.5 (62, 57.5),
9. Surya Sekhar Ganguly 7.5 (62, 57), 10. Sergei Tiviakov (Ned) 7.5 (57).
