Russian GM Pavel Ponkratov (two points) shared the lead after the second round of the 12th Chennai Open International Grandmaster chess tournament for the Sakthi Group Dr. N. Mahalingam Trophy here on Sunday. Ponkrantov defeated Chennai boy R. Rathneesh.
In the upset of the day, Sanket Chakravarthy (Elo 2055) stunned defending champion GM Levan Pantsulaia (Elo 2598) of Georgia.
The English opening game saw Sanket weaving his knight through the defences of black. Pantsulaia gave up his exchange and tried to restore the balance, but the Indian boy converted his advantage smoothly in 52 moves.
Important second round results (Indians unless specified):
R. Rathneesh lost to Pavel Ponkratov (Rus) 2; Jose Eduardo Martinez Alcantara (Per) 2 bt Anda Safranska (Fra) 1; Sanket Chakravarty (2) bt Levan Pantsulaia (Geo) 1; Aleksej Aleksandrov (Blr) 2 bt Sai Varshith Chilukuri (1); Ravi Gopal Hegde (1) lost to Aleksey Goganov (Rus) 2; Mikheil Mchedlishvili (Geo) 2 bt M. Vinoth Kumar.
Sa Kannan (1) lost to Ivan Rozum (Rus) 2; Stanislav Bogdanovich (Ukr) 2 bt R. Abinandhan (1); P Sri Sai Baswanth (1.5)drew with Alberto David (Ita) 1.5; Alexei Fedorov (Blr) 2 bt Akshay Borgaonkar (1); Vivek Nambiar (1) lost to N.R. Visakh (2); Sergei Yudin (Rus) 2 bt R Karan Trivedi (1); Supreetha Potluri (1) lost to Kirill Stupak (Blr) 2.
