GM Tigran Petrosian wins Kolkata Chess

Kolkata, Mar 6 (UNI) Grandmaster Tigran Petrosian of Armenia annexed the trophy and first prize of (Rs 2,07,000 of Kolkata Open 2007-Grandmaster Chess Tournament at Alekhine Chess Club here today.

He, however, had to wait anxiously for the second board game between Darmen Sadvakasov of Kazakhstan and Alon Greenfeld of Israel to be completed, to assure himself of the sole first prize.

The overnight leader, Petrosian, took a lightning 8 move draw against GM Dimitri Komarov of Ukraine on the top board, in order to assure himself of at least a share of the top prize.

Sadvakasov, however, made him sweat for 4 hours by trying to break down the defences of his Israeli opponent from the black side of a Reti opening. He, however, had to give up the struggle and take the peace offering on the 38th move in a sterile position.

''I liked the tournament very much, it was very strong, the facilities extended to me were comparable to anywhere in the world, I hope to be back in the next edition'', Petrosian said at the prize taking ceremony.

GM Serjei Tiviakov of The Netherlands defeated GM Abhijit Kunte in a fine positional game to tie for the second position with GM Darmen Sadvakasov. Kunte tried the solid Berlin defence against the Ruy lopez opening of the top seeded Dutch player, but he missed a tactic and his kingside pawn structure was shattered. Thereafter, the top seed continued to pick up the weak pawns to force the resignation of the Indian GM on the 61st move.

This victory enabled him to take the second spot because of a better tie-break. The ties were resolved on the basis of the average ratings of the opponents of a player.

Sadvakasov had to be content with the third place.

GM Surya Sekhar Ganguly won a long game against GM Mikheil Kekilidze of Georgia to finish a respectable seventh. It was a good result for the National Champion considering his indifferent start.

IM Sriram Jha and GNGopal won against IM Sundarajan Kidambi and Safin Sukhrat respectively to finish fourth and fifth respectively.

UNI