Chanda scores on luckless day for Indians

A slight mistake cost International Master R B Ramesh dearly, as he was forced to split points, while Sandipan Chanda struck form once again on an otherwise luckless day for Indians in the ninth round of the Linares International Open chess championship.

Trailing at five points, Ramesh will have to get his act together to catch up with Grand Master Etienne Bacrot (2618) of France, who came back into the reckoning with his fifth straight win over GM Motylev of Russia to emerge the sole leader on 7.0 points.

A miscalculation of sorts by previous round winner Ramesh (2467) allowed IM Mateo Ramon (2372) to escape with a draw.

It was Sicilian Taimanov variation and Ramesh obtained a huge advantage, pushing Ramon to the wall right from the opening.

After failing to capitalise on innovative ideas, Ramesh went for a long combination to miss a crucial defence from his opponent to land in an opposite coloured Bishop ending. The draw was agreed on the 43rd move.

IM Sandipan Chanda joined Ramesh on 5.0 points with an easy win over IM Agopov (2354) from Finland.

Chanda played a rare variation with black in a Scheveningen variation of Sicilian defence. Agopov mishandled the position by playing f5 a bit too early to give Chanda a flexible centre.

Unable to withstand the pressure on the Queenside, Agopov lost two pawns to subsequently resign on the 32nd move.

Dinesh Kumar Sharma (2353) played out a draw with Woman Grand Master Almira Skripchenko (2450) of Moldova.

With black pieces, Sharma faced the four Knights defence from Almira and the game transposed into an oppsite coloured Bishop middlegame with little chance available for a decisive result and a draw was agreed upon soon.

International Woman Master Aarthie Ramaswamy (2250) escaped from an adverse position to earn a draw against unrated Spaniard Ramos Martin.

From a Sicilian Alapin variation, Martin sacrificed a pawn in the opening and launched a dangerous attack on Aarthie's King. He then, missed a chance to win a pawn and the players entered a Rook and pawn ending were Aarthie was a pawn up.

She failed to work on the advantage with the game ending in a draw in 88 moves.

Chandrasekhar Gokhale (2326) held higher seeded Armenian IM Kharatorosian (2405) to a creditable draw.

Gokhale played the 'g3' system against the Armenian's King's Indian defence and the players exchanged the Queens early with a slight advantage for Gokhale in the form of more space for his pieces.

Kharatorosian neutralized White's advantage and truce was called in 26 moves.

Sriram Jha (2412) was also involved in a draw with lowly rated Sanchez from Philippines. Jha faced the Semi-Slav variation from Sanchez's White and sacrificed a pawn for initiative.

In time-trouble, Jha looked content to repeat the moves and go for draw in an unclear position.

Rahul Shetty (2331) enjoyed a slight advantage right from the beginning against Shevelev's Caro Kann defence.

Though most of the pieces were exchanged early, Shetty's pawn structure was better. Due to time constraint Shetty had to agree to a draw.

Visweswaran (2289) failed to find the right plan in the opening of Sicilian Alapin against young IM Khamrakulov of Uzbekistan and allowed a dangerous attack on his King.

However, Khamrakulov playing with White, misplayed the attack and allowed Visweswaran to complicate things further with a counter attack on the White's king.

In the time pressure that followed, Black dropped a piece resulting in a defeat for the Indian.

Important Results: GM Bacrot (7.0) bt GM Motylev (6.0); GM Z Zong (6.0) bt GM Epishin (6.0); IM R B Ramesh (5.0) drew IM Ramon Mateo (5.0); WGM Almira (4.5) drew D K Sharma (4.5); IM Agopov (4.0) lost IM Sandipan Chanda (5.0); IM Khamrakulov (5.0) bt Visweswaran (4.0); C S Gokhale (4.0) drew IM Karatorosian (4.0); Rahul Shetty (4.0) drew IM A Shevelev (4.0); Sriram Jha (3.5) drew Sanchez (3.5); San Martin Ramos (3.5) drew IWM Aarthie Ramaswamy (3.5).