Indian Express, India
Aug 24 2004
Harikrishna is joint second
Press Trust of India
New Delhi, August 23: Grandmaster P Harikrishna defeated
International Master Imad Hakki of Syria in the eighth and
penultimate round and moved to joint second spot in the Master’s
section of the 14th edition of Abu Dhabi chess festival here.
Former Asian junior girls’ champion Tania Sachdev moved within
striking distance of her second Women Grandmaster norm after a draw
with WGM Julia Mashinskaya of Russia. Tania took her tally to four
points out of a possible eight and now needs just a draw in the last
round game against IM Alexander Raetsky of Russia to ensure the norm.
Meanwhile, GM Dmitry Bocharov of Russia joined GMs Ghaem Maghami
Ehsan of Iran and Pavel Kotsur of Kazakhstan in lead after a crushing
victory over compatriot GM Evgeny Gleizerov. All the three leaders
have six points each and are followed by top seed Evgeny Vladimirov
of Kazakhstan, Russians Gleizerov and Mikhail Kobalia, Artashes
Minasian of Armenia and Harikrishna on 5.5 points.
With just one round to go in this $16000 prize money tournament as
many as six players including GM Tejas Bakre are in contention for
the spot. Tejas Bakre defeated Zeinab Mamediarova of Azerbaijan in a
fine positional game from the White side of a Cole system. The game
lasted 58 moves. GM R B Ramesh went down to Minasian after a tough
fight from an irregular opening. The Armenian wrapped the issue in 38
moves.
Nisha Mohota was impressive in her victory over local hope Mohamed
Hossein while Eesha Karvade held compatriot IM S Kidambi. Neelotpal
Das lost to Kivanc Haznedaroglu of Turkey and Aarthie Ramaswamy drew
with Tayeb Suhail of UAE.