Press Trust of India, India
Outlook, India
Aug 23 2005

Ganguly back in rhythm at Abu Dhabi chess festival
Aug 23, 2005 06:58:00 PM

>From Our Chess Correspondent
Abu Dhabi (UAE), Aug 23 (PTI) Grandmaster Surya Shekhar Ganguly came
back into reckoning for a place amongst prize winners after a hard
fought victory over Russian International Master Alexander Raetsky in
the eighth round of the Master’s section of 15th Abu Dhabi
International Chess festival here.

IM-in-waiting Abhijeet Gupta’s prospects of his maiden GM norm
suffered a decisive setback as the 15-year-old went down fighting
against GM Dmitry Bocharov of Russia.

With just one round remaining in the USD 16400 prize money
tournament, GM Ashot Ananstesian of Armenia took another step forward
for the coveted winner’s trophy by defeating GM Alesej Aleksandrov of
Belarus.

The Armenian took his tally to 6.5 points after the victory and
emerged as the sole leader. Ukrainian GM Alexander Goloshchapov (6
points) was pushed to the sole second spot after he drew with top
seed Shakhriyar Mamedyarov of Azerbaijan.

As many as six players occupy the fifth spot on 5.5 points while
Ganguly and IM D V Prasad are next in line along with others on 5
points apiece.

For Ganguly, it turned out to be second victory on the trot after he
had lost two games in succession in round 5 and 6. The National
Champion was at his technical best in the endgame.

The opening was a Grunfeld Indian, in which Raetsky played white and
achieved nothing when Ganguly outsmarted him. With a routine pawn
sacrifice in the middle game Ganguly ensured himself play all over
the board and in trying to equalise, Raetsky erred again to find
himself in a slightly inferior endgame. PTI