National Teams 02+03: rough take off

by Priyadarshan Banjan - 10/02/2016

The National Team Chess Championship 2016 witnessed some drama (!) on the second day of play as Air India managed to pull off a blunder by messing up their board order. The mistake did not cost much as the team waltzed into the lead anyway. ChessBase India brings you an illustrated report from the tournament.

National Teams 02+03: rough take off

Three rounds have ended here at the 36th National Teams Championship 2016 in Bhubaneshwar, Orissa and the story that is building up is quite unusual -- Team Petroleum Sports Promotion Board is not in the lead in the Open. Instead, the third seeds Air India have taken flight despite an amateurishly absurd takeoff.

For the second day's play, Team Air India decided that they will revise their board order and bring in their second board GM Tejas Bakre into play and rest IM Swayangsu Satyapragyan. All was well until the rounds were poised to begin when it turned out that their team manager had never sent the revised board order to the officials! To be more precise, he had sent their revised board order to the wrong email address!

This meant that the team had to resort to the default board order, which meant that they could field only three players and their reserve player IM C.S. Gokhale, who was supposed to play, became a tea-sipping spectator.

The affairs meant the Air India players began their day facepalming themselves. Nevertheless, they lead the leaderboard with three wins, the only team to with an all-win record.

Satyapragyan could not make it in time to the games and could only pitch in the third round. The 'well-rested' third board defended stubbornly a vicious attack by...

...IM Anup Deshmukh, who after a while realized that he was just a piece down. Even exercising his muscles did not help him land the killer blow.

It did help Railways-A though, as they steamrolled Gujarat 3.5-0.5

Deepan's game landed on an interesting position where he actually king-walked in a semicircle across the board.

[Event "Indian National Team Chess Championship-"]
[Site "Bhubaneswar"]
[Date "2016.02.09"]
[Round "2"]
[White "Manush, Shah"]
[Black "Deepan, Chakkravarthy J"]
[Result "0-1"]
[WhiteElo "2066"]
[BlackElo "2481"]
[SetUp "1"]
[FEN "8/4p1k1/1p1pP1p1/3P4/2q1PP2/p1P2P2/6K1/4Q3 w - - 0 34"]
[PlyCount "40"]
[EventDate "2016.??.??"]
[Source "MonRoi"]

{At the first glance, the position may appear to be winning for black, but
white has his resources.} 34. f5 (34. Qh4 $1 {is a cunning move that draws.}
Qc7 $4 (34... a2 35. Qxe7+ $11) (34... Qe2+ $11) 35. f5 Qd8 36. Qg5 Qe8 37. e5
$1 dxe5 38. d6 $18) 34... a2 35. Qc1 Qa4 36. Qg5 Qe8 37. Qc1 $4 (37. e5 $3 dxe5
(37... a1=Q 38. f6+ $18) 38. d6 a1=Q 39. d7 Qa2+ 40. Kg3 Qf8 41. Qxg6+ Kh8 42.
d8=Q Qxd8 43. Qh6+ Kg8 44. Qg6+ Kh8 $11) 37... gxf5 38. exf5 Qh5 39. Qb2 Qg5+
40. Kf1 Qh4 $1 41. Kg2 Qa4 $2 42. Qd2 Kf6 43. Qh6+ Ke5 44. c4 (44. f6 $1 exf6
45. e7 a1=Q 46. Qh5+ f5 47. e8=Q+ Qxe8 48. Qxe8+ Kxd5 49. Qb5+ $11) 44... Kd4
45. Qf4+ Kc5 46. Qe3+ Kxc4 47. Qe4+ Kb5 48. Qe2+ Kc5 49. Qe3+ Kxd5 50. Qd2+ Kc6
51. Qc3+ Kb7 52. Qa1 Qc2+ 53. Kg3 Qb1 0-1

Priyanka K. (2023) had a tough position to hold against Air India's Viji, but she managed to fish out a perpetual and earn a memorable draw, something that may inspire her to aim higher!

Her draw did not save Tamil Nadu Women's team as they lost to Air India anyway. On the top board, PSPB Women's team brown washed KIIT University.

The PSPB Men's team had a rough start to their day as GM Debashis Das lost to...

...unheralded Sayan Bose (1991) of West Bengal in a beautiful attacking game.

[Event "Indian National Team Chess Championship-"]
[Site "Bhubaneswar"]
[Date "2016.02.09"]
[Round "2"]
[White "Bose, Sayan"]
[Black "Debashis, Das"]
[Result "1-0"]
[WhiteElo "1991"]
[BlackElo "2487"]
[PlyCount "75"]
[EventDate "2016.??.??"]
[Source "MonRoi"]

1. e4 c5 2. Nc3 d6 3. f4 g6 4. Nf3 Bg7 5. Bc4 Nc6 6. O-O e6 7. d3 Nge7 8. Qe1
O-O 9. Bb3 Na5 10. Qh4 Nxb3 11. axb3 Nc6 12. Qg3 f5 13. Be3 Bd7 14. e5 Qe7 15.
Rae1 b6 16. Kh1 Rae8 17. Nb5 d5 18. Nd6 Rb8 19. Qh3 Nb4 20. Re2 d4 21. Bf2 Bc6
22. Bh4 Qd7 23. Bg5 Nd5 24. Rc1 Nc7 25. c3 dxc3 26. bxc3 Ne8 27. Nxe8 Rfxe8 28.
Rd2 Qb7 29. d4 Qa6 30. c4 Qa3 31. Rcd1 Qxb3 32. d5 Bd7 33. Bf6 Rb7 34. Rd3 Qxc4
35. dxe6 Bxe6 36. Rd8 Rxd8 37. Rxd8+ Bf8 {Mate in three.} 38. Qh6 1-0

PSPB's third round match with Airport Authority of India ended in a draw as IM Visakh NR held GM Arun Prasad despite having a suspicious position...

...and then, even though IM Stany lost, AAI managed to pull one back as PSPB's GM Abhijit Kunte lost to...

...AAI's IM VAV Rajesh, who made excellent use of the line opening tactics his position was blessed with.

[Event "Indian National Team Chess Championship-"]
[Site "Bhubaneswar"]
[Date "2016.02.09"]
[Round "3"]
[White "Rajesh, V A V."]
[Black "Kunte, Abhijit"]
[Result "1-0"]
[WhiteElo "2341"]
[BlackElo "2506"]
[PlyCount "69"]
[EventDate "2016.??.??"]
[Source "MonRoi"]

1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 e6 3. Nc3 Bb4 4. e3 O-O 5. Bd3 d5 6. Nf3 c5 7. O-O cxd4 8. exd4
dxc4 9. Bxc4 Nbd7 10. Bg5 Bxc3 11. bxc3 Qc7 12. Qe2 b6 13. Rac1 Bb7 14. Bd3 h6
15. Bd2 Rac8 16. Rfe1 Rfd8 17. c4 Qd6 18. Bc3 Qf4 19. Nd2 Nb8 20. d5 exd5 21.
Be5 Qg5 22. Nf3 Qh5 23. Bxf6 gxf6 24. Qe7 Ba6 25. Qxf6 Nd7 26. Qf4 dxc4 27. Bf5
Rc5 28. Qg3+ (28. Bxd7 Rxd7 29. Qf6 Rc8 30. Ne5 Rdc7 31. Rc3 Kh7 32. Rg3 Rg8
33. Rxg8 Kxg8 34. Qd8+ $18) 28... Kf8 29. Qd6+ Kg7 30. Bxd7 Bb7 31. Qe7 Rxd7
32. Qxd7 Bxf3 33. Qd4+ Kh7 34. Re8 Qd5 {and now Mate in 4.} 35. Qf6 1-0

The second board match between Railways-A and Railways-B was washed out due to rains.

Meanwhile, Tamil Nadu-A and Tamil Nadu-B fought tooth and nail, in a battle of equals that ended in a draw anyway.

BSNL's ace Ram Krishnan had a forgettable day at work as he lost both his games; however, he had reasons to smile as...

...it was his son Poornachandar's first birthday!

Anyway, the games are live right now and you can watch them here.

View the Pairings for Open Round 04 here.

View the Pairings for Women Round 04 here.

Photos for ChessBase India