Aniruddha Deshpande produced a perfect finish to stun second-seeded Russian Grandmaster Ivan Popov and provided a dramatic twist to the tale of predictable results in the opening round of the Rs. 30-lakh Parsvnath Delhi International Open chess tournament here on Friday.
Popov, fresh from winning the Chennai Open, underestimated the abilities of the 26-year-old chess coach in Accelerated Dragon variation of Sicilian Defence and eventually resigned after 59 moves.
The day also saw two other Grandmasters, Russia's Mikhail Mozharov and last year's runner-up Ukraine's Valeriy Neverov, seeded five and 17, settle for draws against youngster Pratik Patil and the seasoned campaigner G. B. Joshi.
After top seed Abhijeet Gupta battled to a 62-move victory over N. Krishna Teja, Despande nailed Popov to bring down the biggest overseas seed in a sensational finish on day when 71 out of 89 contests produced decisive verdicts.
After Deshpande, rated 465 points below his rival at 2157, offered a pawn for faster development of his pieces before, Popov gained another queen-side pawn by the 21st move.
Sensing danger, Popov returned a king-side pawn but his position was far from secure. The Russian did chase down the black castled king to the centre of the board but the ploy only helped Deshpande improve the position. Later, with both players pushing their pawns on either flanks, Popov sacrificed his rook for a bishop but could not prevent Deshpande fromqueening his king-side pawn. With the queen back on the board, Deshpande needed six more moves to land the decisive blow.
The results (first round): N. Krishna Teja lost to Abhijeet Gupta; Ivan Popov (Rus) lost to Aniruddha Despande; Rajib Dhar lost toAnton Demchenko (Rus); Alberto David (Ita) bt Harshit Raja; Pratik Patil drew with Mikhail Mozharov (Rus).
Sabino Brunello (Ita) bt P.Iniyan; Aref Vasli (Iri) lost to Cristhian Cruz (Per); Andrey Baryshpolets (Ukr) lost to J. Yohan; Rakesh Kumar Jena lost to Alexander Evdokimov (Rus); Sahaj Grover bt S. Niraj; Anish Gandhi lost to Eldar Gasanov (Ukr).
