Pune: Grandmaster SP Sethuraman virtually sealed his title with one round remaining in the 60th National Chess Championship which being organised by the Maharashtra Chess Association and played at the Boxing Hall of the e Shiv Chhatrapati Sports Complex in Mhalunge Balewadi here. Sethuraman won his game with the black pieces and now has 9 points out of 10 rounds.
IM Aronyak Ghosh and GM Diptayan Ghosh, playing on board 2, played out a quick theoretical draw. The game ended in less than 30 minutes, giving both the players a much-needed rest ahead of their important last round game.
On board 3, inform GM Vigneh NR played out a solid draw against GM Vishnu Prasanna. Both played a solid opening and played a safe game, right until both players happily agreed to a draw. GM Vignesh NR had some chances in the middle game, but GM Prasanna found the best moves, and the game ended in a deserved draw.
Top seed GM Abhijeet Gupta, playing on board 4, won his game with the black pieces against a strong GM Sayanatan Das. Gupta, played a marathon game, and kept on pressing against his opponent. In the end, Gupta managed to get a much-deserved win, defeating one of the inform players in this tournament. Gupta is at 8 points out of 10 rounds, with 2 losses.
Results (Tenth Round):
Neelash Saha (7.5) (RSPB)lost to Sethuraman, SP (9) (PSPB).
Aronyak, Ghosh (8) (RSPB) drew with Diptayan Ghosh (8) (Ben).
Vignesh, NR (8) (RSPB) drew with Vishnu Prasanna. V (8) (TN).
Sayantan Das (7) (RSPB) lost to Abhijeet Gupta (8) (PSPB).
Abhimanyu Puranik (8) (AAI) bt Akash, G (7) (TN).
Mitrabha, Guha (8) (WB) bt Deepan Chakkravarthy J (7) (RSPB).
Srihari LR (7.5) (TN) drew with Iniyan P (7.5) (TN).
Utsab, Chatterjee (6.5) (WB) lost to Surya Shekhar Ganguly (7.5) (PSPB).
Visakh NR (7.5) (RSPB) bt Kolla Bhaavan (6.5) (AP).
Deep Sengupta(7) (PSPB) drew with Dinesh Sharma (7) (LIC).
Suyog Wagh (7.5) (Mah) bt Shyaamnikhil P (6.5) (RSPB).
Abhishek Kelkar (6.5) (Mah) lost to Venkatesh, MR(7.5) (PSPB).
Apoorv, Kamble (7.5) (KAR) bt Anuj Shrivatri (6.5) (MP).
Dhananjay S (6.5) (Cht) lost to Krishna, CRG (7.5) (RSPB).
Nitin S (7.5) (RSPB) bt Samyak Dharewa (6.5) (en).
Ram, S Krishnan (6.5) (BSNL) lost to Utkal Sahoo (7.5) (ODI).
Mukund Agarwal (6) (Guj) lost to Sidhant Mohapatra(7) (RSPB).
Arghyadip Das (7) (RSPB) bt Shriraj Bhosale (6) (Mah).
