International Master Swapnil Dhopade of India joined Grandmasters Nigel Short of England and Surya Sekhar Ganguly of India at the top, with 4.5 points each, after the fifth round of the LIC International Grandmasters chess here on Friday.
Swapnil, who has already collected five GM norms, outplayed GM Vladislav Kovalev of Belarus in a sharp four pawns attack in a King’s Indian defence. Playing white, Swapnil won two pawns in a minor piece ending after which he had little difficulty in forcing a win.
Short tried frantically to get a favourable result from a sterile position in a knight ending against GM Ganguly. The latter, however, defended with precision and held his position and peace was signed after 57 moves.
Playing on the second board, Indian GMs M.R. Lalith Babu and Deepan Chakkravarthy were content at retaining their positions near the top as they agreed for a draw after 25 moves. IM Narayan Srinath handled the Ruy Lopez opening well against Cuban GM Quesada Yuniesky to force a draw while IM Swayams Mishra held compatriot GM Deep Sengupta in a knight ending with the black pieces.
In another upset, GM Abdulla Al-Rakib of Bangladesh blundered a rook under severe time pressure and lost to IM Shardul Gagare of India in a Queen’s Pawn opening.
Important results (fifth round): Nigel Short (Eng) 4.5 drew with Surya Sekhar Ganguly 4.5; M.R. Lalith Babu 4 drew with Deepan Chakkravarthy 4; Swapnil Dhopade 4.5 bt Vladisav Kovalev (Blr) 3.5; Arghyadip Das 3 lost to Dimitry Kokarev (Rus) 4; Quesada Yuniesky (Cub) 3.5 drew with Narayan Srinath 3.5; G.N. Gopal 3.5 drew with Lin Chen (Chn) 3.5; Lu Shanglei (Chn) 4 bt Xu Yinglun (Chn) 3; Deep Sengupta 3.5 drew with Swayams Mishra 3.5; Neelotpal Das 3 lost to Kirill Stupak (Blr) 4; Abdulla Al-Rakib (Ban) 3 lost to Shardul Gagare 4; Wang Chen (Chn) 4 bt S. Ravi Teja 3.
