GM Merab Gagunashvili Shocked
By Praful Zaveri

The 2nd round top-seeded GM Michael Kransenkow was held to a draw and the 3rd round saw GM Elizaar Ubilava crashing to a shock defeat, today was the turn of 3rd seeded Georgian, GM Gagunashvili Merab (ELO 2553) who could not withstand the onslaught of veteran Indian, B.T. Muralikrishnan. In a Pirc Defense game, Murali, playing white, adopted a rarely played line to take his famed opponent out of the opening preparation. The strategy proved successful as Merab was unable to find the correct plan and was soon saddled with too many weaknesses on his King side. Murali's pieces got commanding outposts and, with a nice piece sacrifice on move 34, he created mating threats, which the Georgian could ward off only by returning heavy material. He resigned in a hopeless position on move 41.

On the top board, Super GM and current World's 2nd ranked Woman player, Koneru Humpy continued her excellent run by overcoming IM Vikramaditya Kamble in 48 moves from the white-side of the King's Indian fianchetto system. With Vikramditya introducing complications in the opening stage with a pawn sacrifice on move 10, Humpy drew upon all her experience to find the correct continuation and launched a blistering attack on the King-side. Vikramditya was forced to give up an exchange to prevent mate after which the rest was a technique for Humpy to romp home in 45 moves.

In the game between former Indian National Champion Konguvel and Polish GM Macieja on the 2nd board, Macieja, playing black, failed to equalize in the opening, which allowed Konguvel to win an exchange. The chance for one more upset appeared brighter as Konguvel firmly established his Queen and Rook however; he overlooked a simple Knight attack of Black to hand back the advantage to Macieja and just drifted towards defeat.

Meanwhile, the Bangladeshi Grandmasters, Al-Rakib, Ziaur Rahman and Reefat Sattar had no difficulty in defeating their respective opponents, IM Sudhakar Babu and Shashikant Kutwal & IM D.P. Singh respectively to march into the round 4 with as many points.

IM R.R. Laxman, fresh from his successful Dubai tourney wherein he earned his GM norm, easily defeated WGM Swati Ghate.

The lead is now shared by 14 players with a full score of 4 points after as many rounds in this 11.00 Lakh prize money tournament.


Key Results of Round 4:

GM Koneru Humpy 2603 IND 4 Beat 3 IM Kamble Vikramaditya 2378 IND
IM Konguvel P 2373 IND 3 Lost to 4 GM Macieja Bartlomiej 2599 POL
Murali Krishnan B T 2361 IND 4 Beat 3 GM Gagunashvili Merab 2553 GEO
IM Babu N Sudhakar 2356 IND 3 Lost to 4 GM Abdulla Al-Rakib 2514 BAN
GM Rahman Ziaur 2511 BAN 4 Beat 3 Shashikant Kutwal 2356 IND
WGM Swathi Ghate 2350 IND 3 Lost to 4 IM Laxman R R 2488 IND
IM Singh D P 2308 IND 3 Lost to 4 GM Reefat Bin-Sattar 2487 BAN
GM Safin Shukhrat 2481 UZB 4 Beat 3 FM Vidit Gujrathi 2337 IND
Lalith Babu M R 2305 IND 3½ Drew 3½ GM Ramesh R B 2472 IND
Ram S Krishnan 2299 IND 3½ Drew 3½ GM Bakre Tejas 2455 IND
IM Sriram Jha 2452 IND 3½ Drew 3½ IM Gokhale C S 2321 IND
Udeshi Aditya 2299 IND 3 Lost to 4 IM Venkatesh M R 2450 IND
IM Sengupta Deep 2446 IND 4 Beat 3 WIM Soumya S 2303 IND
IM Adhiban B 2421 IND 4 Beat 3 Sharma R Preetham 2299 IND
Neelakantan N 2160 IND 3 Lost to 4 Thejkumar M S 2414 IND
IM Himanshu Sharma 2412 IND 4 Beat 3 Purushothaman T 2290 IND
Pranav Shetty 2100 IND 3 Lost to 4 IM Satyapragyan S 2410 IN
 

Kransekow Maintains Lead

GM Shukrat Takes Sole Lead

Top-seeded GM Michael Kransekow Held
 

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