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Sethuraman S.P. got into some serious trouble against Raunak Sadhwani in the first round of Aeroflot Open 2020 but somehow managed to turn the tables at the very last moment. His second round against Deep Sengupta was however a completely different story. Deep went for an offbeat sideline of the French defense with the black pieces but really couldn't pose any real challenge as Sethuraman kept improving his pieces slowly and steadily, maintaining a nagging edge throughout. On move 40, the bengal Grandmaster finally gave away and made the decisive error which allowed his opponent to fully unleash his bishop pair.

Sethuraman played a dominating game in the second round to climb atop the leaderboard. Deep had a tough day at the office, he is up against S.L.Narayanan in the next round and would be looking to make a swift recovery | Photo: Puneet Jaiswal

Sethuraman S.P. - Deep Sengupta, Round 2

Deep's 3...dxe4 was unusual. Moves like 3...Bb4 or 3...Nf6 leading to the Winawer or the Tarrasch are certainly more mainstream.

White already stands more comfortable with better space. What would you play as Black here?

Well, when you have already pushed b7-b6 and your bishop is on c6, it makes sense to just play Bc6-b7 but in the game Deep mysteriously went 11...Bxf3 although this is not a bad move at all but it seems a tad unprincipled from the human point of view. Perhaps keeping the light-squared bishop for the moment would have been wiser.

Next, Black offered an exchange of queens on move 14 which White promptly refused and went Qe2. Note that 15.Qxd5 Nxd5 would have not yielded much.

Sethuraman started to take charge round about here. Note that Bxf6 is a threat already.

Black intended to get something going by maneuvering his knight to f4!

White's advantage here is conspicuous. The threat on g2 is superficial and can simply be thwarted with f3 but once the queens are off the board those bishops would really turn into monsters.

And the exchange of queens was going to be forced sooner or later.

With the deadly pair of bishops nicely cutting across the board, the position above is already quite difficult for Black to play. The correct move here would have been fxg3 but Deep erred with g6-g5 which weakened the kingside and led his position to collapse immediately.

The threats on Black's king were now quite serious.

And as the rook entered the foray, Black had no options but to resign.

Photo Gallery

Pranesh M pulled off what was arguably the biggest shocker of the day by beating Boris Savchenko in just 21 moves. Read our article on this brilliant victory here. | Photo: Puneet Jaiswal

Praggnanandhaa had a smooth sailing against Sreeshwan Maralakshikari with white pieces in the second round | Photo: Puneet Jaiswal

S.L.Narayanan has drawn both his games so far and is on 1.0/2 points | Photo: Puneet Jaiswal

Vignesh NR is happy with his performance. He defeated the triple-crown National Champion Aravindh Chithambaram in the first round and also held the ever creative Vadim Zvjaginsev to a draw in round two | Photo: Puneet Jaiswal

Ayan Chopra became the best performing Indian at the Gibraltar Master this year. He has started off his campaign solidly here as well with two draws in a row | Photo: Puneet Jaiswal

Leon Mendonca was taken down in the second round by compatriot Vaibhav Suri | Photo: Puneet Jaiswal

Aditya Mittal is another talented Indian junior in the open A category who is doing very well. He drew Grandmasters Manuel Petrosian and Aleksandr Shimanov in rounds one and two respectively | Photo: Puneet Jaiswal

Results of top ten boards in round 2

Bo.	No.		Name	FED	Rtg	Pts.	Result	Pts.		Name	FED	Rtg	No.
1	33	GM	Can Emre	TUR	2600	1	½ - ½	1	GM	Artemiev Vladislav	RUS	2728	1
2	36	GM	Sargsyan Shant	ARM	2594	1	1 - 0	1	GM	Maghsoodloo Parham	IRI	2674	3
3	37	GM	Cordova Emilio	PER	2593	1	½ - ½	1	GM	Sarana Alexey	RUS	2656	5
4	6	GM	Adhiban B.	IND	2654	1	½ - ½	1	GM	Sindarov Javokhir	UZB	2537	57
5	41	GM	Wagner Dennis	GER	2590	1	½ - ½	1	GM	Kovalev Vladislav	BLR	2650	7
6	45	GM	Sanal Vahap	TUR	2569	1	0 - 1	1	GM	Mamedov Rauf	AZE	2643	11
7	12	GM	Sethuraman S.P.	IND	2641	1	1 - 0	1	GM	Sengupta Deep	IND	2534	59
8	20	GM	Durarbayli Vasif	AZE	2625	1	½ - ½	1		Nesterov Arseniy	RUS	2501	67
9	64	GM	Visakh N R	IND	2518	1	½ - ½	1	GM	Zvjaginsev Vadim	RUS	2623	21
10	94	IM	Badelka Olga	BLR	2404	1	0 - 1	1	GM	Zhou Jianchao	CHN	2622	23

Results of all Indians in round 2

Rd.	Bo.	No.		Name	FED	Rtg	Pts.	Result	Pts.		Name	FED	Rtg	No.
2	4	6	GM	Adhiban B.	IND	2654	1	½ - ½	1	GM	Sindarov Javokhir	UZB	2537	57
2	7	12	GM	Sethuraman S.P.	IND	2641	1	1 - 0	1	GM	Sengupta Deep	IND	2534	59
2	9	64	GM	Visakh N R	IND	2518	1	½ - ½	1	GM	Zvjaginsev Vadim	RUS	2623	21
2	12	96	IM	Bharath Subramaniyam H	IND	2402	1	½ - ½	1	GM	Karthikeyan Murali	IND	2602	30
2	13	2	GM	Sargissian Gabriel	ARM	2689	½	½ - ½	½	GM	Chanda Sandipan	IND	2552	53
2	15	49	GM	Aryan Chopra	IND	2562	½	½ - ½	½	GM	Rakhmanov Aleksandr	RUS	2645	9
2	17	14	GM	Narayanan.S.L	IND	2637	½	½ - ½	½	GM	Kulaots Kaido	EST	2510	65
2	23	26	GM	Smirin Ilia	ISR	2615	½	½ - ½	½	IM	Raja Harshit	IND	2472	73
2	26	31	GM	Praggnanandhaa R	IND	2602	½	1 - 0	½	IM	Sreeshwan Maralakshikari	IND	2440	83
2	28	80	IM	Krishna C R G	IND	2443	½	0 - 1	½	GM	Puranik Abhimanyu	IND	2597	34
2	31	88	IM	Aditya Mittal	IND	2427	½	½ - ½	½	GM	Shimanov Aleksandr	RUS	2587	42
2	33	39	GM	Vaibhav Suri	IND	2591	½	1 - 0	½	IM	Mendonca Leon Luke	IND	2418	91
2	35	90	FM	Pranesh M	IND	2425	½	1 - 0	½	GM	Savchenko Boris	RUS	2573	44
2	36	47	GM	Sychev Klementy	RUS	2563	½	1 - 0	½	WGM	Soumya Swaminathan	IND	2369	97
2	38	10	GM	Abdusattorov Nodirbek	UZB	2644	0	1 - 0	0	IM	Sadhwani Raunak	IND	2522	61
2	39	60	IM	Kozak Adam	HUN	2523	0	0 - 1	0	GM	Aravindh Chithambaram Vr.	IND	2630	15
2	40	18	GM	Shtembuliak Evgeny	UKR	2628	0	1 - 0	0	GM	Karthik Venkataraman	IND	2483	69
2	42	70	IM	Rahul Srivatshav P	IND	2474	0	0 - 1	0	GM	Erigaisi Arjun	IND	2563	46
2	45	52	GM	Frolyanov Dmitry	RUS	2556	0	½ - ½	0	IM	Vignesh N R	IND	2436	85

Standings of players after round 2

Rk.	SNo		Name	FED	Rtg	Pts.	TB1	TB2
1	11	GM	Mamedov Rauf	AZE	2643	2,0	1	0
	12	GM	Sethuraman S.P.	IND	2641	2,0	1	0
	23	GM	Zhou Jianchao	CHN	2622	2,0	1	0
4	36	GM	Sargsyan Shant	ARM	2594	2,0	0	0
5	1	GM	Artemiev Vladislav	RUS	2728	1,5	1	0
	4	GM	Sjugirov Sanan	RUS	2674	1,5	1	0
	5	GM	Sarana Alexey	RUS	2656	1,5	1	0
	6	GM	Adhiban B.	IND	2654	1,5	1	0
	7	GM	Kovalev Vladislav	BLR	2650	1,5	1	0
	17	GM	Paravyan David	RUS	2629	1,5	1	0
	19	GM	Deac Bogdan-Daniel	ROU	2626	1,5	1	0
	20	GM	Durarbayli Vasif	AZE	2625	1,5	1	0
	21	GM	Zvjaginsev Vadim	RUS	2623	1,5	1	0
	24	GM	Jobava Baadur	GEO	2620	1,5	1	0
	27	GM	Kobalia Mikhail	RUS	2609	1,5	1	0
	28	GM	Svane Rasmus	GER	2608	1,5	1	0
	29	GM	Yilmaz Mustafa	TUR	2607	1,5	1	0
	30	GM	Karthikeyan Murali	IND	2602	1,5	1	0
	31	GM	Praggnanandhaa R	IND	2602	1,5	1	0
	33	GM	Can Emre	TUR	2600	1,5	1	0
	34	GM	Puranik Abhimanyu	IND	2597	1,5	1	0
	37	GM	Cordova Emilio	PER	2593	1,5	1	0
	38	GM	Aleksandrov Aleksej	BLR	2592	1,5	1	0
	39	GM	Vaibhav Suri	IND	2591	1,5	1	0
	40	GM	Petrosyan Manuel	ARM	2590	1,5	1	0
	41	GM	Wagner Dennis	GER	2590	1,5	1	0
	43	GM	Idani Pouya	IRI	2577	1,5	1	0
	47	GM	Sychev Klementy	RUS	2563	1,5	1	0
	57	GM	Sindarov Javokhir	UZB	2537	1,5	1	0
	64	GM	Visakh N R	IND	2518	1,5	1	0
	67		Nesterov Arseniy	RUS	2501	1,5	1	0
	68	IM	Zanan Evgeny	ISR	2500	1,5	1	0
	71	IM	Suleymanli Aydin	AZE	2474	1,5	1	0
	90	FM	Pranesh M	IND	2425	1,5	1	0
	96	IM	Bharath Subramaniyam H	IND	2402	1,5	1	0

We are thankful to Puneet Jaiswal, a well-known trainer and coach of the Indian team at the Aeroflot, for sending us photos from the venue.