Indian Women beat Romania while men succumb to Israel at Chess Olympiad
By Vijay Kumar

Turin 2nd June 2006. India’s Star player Grandmaster Viswanathan Anand again drew on the top board in the 11th Round of the Chess Olympiad being played here at Turin. All Indian hopes for a chance for a medal dashed to ground when Sasikiran and Sandipan Chanda lost their games against Illia Smirin and Boris Avrukh of Israel respectively. Harikrishna was lucky to have drawn his game against Emil Sutovsky .


Playing with white against Boris Gelfand in this Olympaid Viswanathan Anand wanted to repeat his last round victory in the Corus chess tournament of 2006 but this time his first move e4 met with tough play after Gelfand played c5 and the game soon drifted to a ususal Sicilian Nazdorf pattern.

Anand played some good moves in the opening and Gelfand also did the same. With his 17th move Anand gave a Nxf6 check to Gelfand king that the latter easily repulsed with his next moeve and thereafter a few moves later both players decided there was no point in playing further and therefore agreed to the draw after 23 moves.

On the seond board many experts thought that Harikrishna was playing for a draw but Sutovsky was trying for a win. Playing with white Harikrishna also played e4 and Sutovsky played d5 to cause him problems. After 26 moves both players realised that it was equal positon and shook hands.

On the women front Swati Ghate played a brilliant game and taking the advantage of her opponent’s blunder in the time pressure she won the game. Talking to UNI immediately after her victory Swati said “ I was a bit lucky today . I was quite shaky however I got a good advantage in the opening but somehow I missed the opportunity as I slipped on my bishop d2 move . But luckily my opponent vlundered in the time pressure and I won the game on technicality”

Grandmaster Koneru Humpy also played very well and had opening advantage in the Queens Indian when she gave a check to her opponent Corina Peptans on the 17th move with Nxf6+ but Peptan ‘s Queen was there to grab her Knight and averted the attack. Thereafter no one was interested in taking any risk and agreed for a draw.

Harika Dronnavilli , who had black against Foisor Adela , also played a good game and held her White opponent in a game which was fought on English Symmetrical lines.

Armenia defeated Czech Republic 3-1 to take their tally to 32 points a clear 3.5 points ahead of China and France who are jointly on the 2nd spot with 28.5 points


In the women Olympiad Ukraine is leading the table with 25.5 points a clear 2 points ahead of Russia and China .

On the FIDE front . Kirsan Illyumzhinov defeated Basel Kok for the President ship of the World Body. He got a massive 97-56 margin.