Heartbreak for Indian contingent at the World Cadets 2019

by Satanick Mukhuty - 02/09/2019

The FIDE World Cadet Chess Championships 2019 came to a heartbreaking conclusion for the Indian contingent. Vivaan Vijay Saraogi, who emerged as one of the leaders in the under-8 open, failed to deliver in the final round and with that the country's hopes for a medal were dashed. In the under-10 section the encounter between Yash Bharadia and Ilamparthy A R ended in a draw which meant that both missed out on podium finish narrowly. In the same category Mayank Chakraborty registered a consoling victory, thus climbing up to a satisfactory seventh place on the rank-list. No other Indians could manage a top ten finish in the remaining categories. All in all, quite a forgettable event for Indian chess.

The Indian contingent with 31 of its participants had one of the largest representations in this years World Cadet Championships. Some of these players were seeded in the top five in their respective categories to begin with and therefore were expected to perform well. But unfortunately no one could rise to the occasion and bag even a single medal. Well, that's the nature of sports, sometimes you win and sometimes you just learn and move on! The best results in the event were secured by Russia, USA, and China followed by Kazakhstan, Mongolia, and Vietnam who too performed surprisingly well. The medal statistics after eleven rounds is given below:

Rk.	FED	gold	silver	bronze	Total
1	RUS	3	0	0	3
2	USA	2	0	2	4
3	CHN	1	4	2	7
4	KAZ	0	2	0	2
5	MGL	0	0	1	1
	VIE	0	0	1	1

Vivaan's Pirc flounder shatters India's medal hopes

Vivaan finished fifth in the under-8 open with a score of 8.0/11 and came the closest to a podium finish.

The only two loss in the event was handed to him by Lebedev Artem S and Tulendinov D, the leaders of the event.

Going into the final round, India's best hope for a medal rested in the hands Vivaan Vijay Saraogi. Vivaan emerged as one of the leaders in the under-8 open after the penultimate round ten of the event. In round eleven he was paired up with the black pieces against another leader, namely Lebedev Artem S. of Russia. The game started off with 1.e4 g6 and the Indian youngster soon entered into an unfavourable position out of the opening.

Lebedev Artem S. - Vivaan Vijay Saraogi, Round 11

Position after 11.Be3: Black played the awkward 11...Ne6 which allowed White to expand on the kingside with 12.f4. Simplifying instead with 11...Bxc3 12.bxc3 Re8 would have kept even chances.

18.Qd3 wasn't the greatest of moves, Black had a chance here to equalize and even get an edge. But Vivaan went for 18...Qc8 which allowed White to capitalize with 19.Nd5

A wiser plan would have been to just give up the f5 pawn and consolidate with 18...c6. The point is after something like 19.Qxf5 d5 20.Kh2 Qd6 Black has managed to shut off White's g2 bishop completely.

Analysis board

In this position White is up a pawn but has no play. Black is solid and has an active pair of bishops which can potentially turn dangerous if the position opens up more.

But 18...Qc8 played in the game allowed White to keep the initiative going. The game followed 19.Nd5 Bxd5 20.Bxd5+ and Black had to part with his bishop pair, while White managed to bring his light-squared bishop to a better square.

Here 22...Qf6?! didn't alleviate Black's troubles. Instead 22...Bxb2 23.Rab1 Ra3! would have been a nice way to generate counterplay and bring balance back in the position. Vivaan missed one more opportunity.

26.Qe2 was the final nail on Black's coffin. Qh5+ followed by Qh7# is a threat already and Black's most important piece, the queen, is too far away to come to aid. White was soon able to bring his rooks into the foray and on move 37 the game ended with a checkmate.

Yash, Ilamparthy split point and Mayank Chakraborty registers a final win!

In the under-10 section medal hopes dwindled when Yash Bharadia and Ilamparthy A R were paired up against each other in the final round. The encounter between these two talented youngsters ended in a draw after 48 moves in the following position.

Yash Bharadia - Ilamparthy A R, Round 11

White seems to have slight edge with the queenside pawn majority. Do you think Yash should have pushed for a win?

Mayank Chakraborty registered two victories in the last two rounds of the event to finish seventh just behind Ilamparthy and Yash with a score of 8.0/11 | Photo: Shantharam Kadanthaly Venkatraman

Mayank suffered defeats in rounds seventh and ninth but recovered well in the end.

Mayank was up against Wang Yixiao of China with the white pieces in final round of the event. The game opened with a Ruy Lopez and was played on well trodden theory until when on move 17 Black blundered.

Mayank Chakraborty - Wang Yixiao, Round 11

17...Be4 was careless. Can you find how White can take advantage of this?

The correct move, and which indeed was played in the game, is 18.Ba2. With best play from this position 18...Qd8 19.Nd4 Nxd4 20.Bxd4 White seizes a tangible initiative.

Analysis board

White's bishops are nicely placed on a2-g8 and a1-h8 diagonals and it now seems Black's d3 pawn has come too far down the board.

The game however went 18...Qd7 19.Bf4 Qf5 20.Nd2 Bxg2 21.Bg3 Bh3 22.Bd5! and here Black's light-square weaknesses in the center became apparent.

There's no good way to defend the c6 knight. In the game 22...Qg6 was played and White won the knight with the simple 23.e6. This was game over for Black!

Photo Gallery

Ilamparthy A R (left) finished fourth in the under-10 open event and missed podium finish by a whisker | Photo: Shantharam Kadanthaly Venkatraman

Yash Bharadia finished sixth with same 8.0/11 score as Ilamparthy | Photo: imsa.cn

Mahendra Teja Makela in under-12 open scored 6.0/11 points | Photo: imsa.cn

Mahendra played with a performance rating of 1996 and gained a whopping 110.8 Elo points.

Ayushman Mohanty of under-8 scored 6.5/11 points and gained 33.2 rating points | Photo: imsa.cn

Ishaan Singh Khanuja won his last two rounds and also finished with 6.5/11, gaining 34 Elo points in the process | Photo: imsa.cn

Atharva Bang of under-12 did poorly in the first half of the event but recovered in the second half to finish with a decent 5.5/11 | Photo: imsa.cn

Aishani Pathak was the fourth seed in under-8 girls but finished 31st with a score of 6.0/11 | Photo: imsa.cn

Savith Shri B's performance in the under-12 girls was perhaps the most disappointing. She was the top seed yet had to finish twelfth with a sombre 7.0/11 | Photo: imsa.cn

An overview of all Indian performances after eleven rounds

SNo		Name	RtgI	FED	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	Pts.	Rk.	K	rtg+/-	Group
9		Vivaan Vijay Saraogi	1480	IND	1	1	1	0	1	½	1	1	1	½	0	8,0	5	40	3,60	U8 Open
22		Jaivardhan Raj	1287	IND	1	1	½	1	0	½	1	0	0	0	1	6,0	34	40	6,40	U8 Open
27		Ayushman Mohanty	1269	IND	1	0	1	1	1	½	0	1	0	1	0	6,5	22	40	33,20	U8 Open
28		Amogh Bisht	1260	IND	1	1	0	1	½	1	0	0	1	0	1	6,5	24	40	15,20	U8 Open
29		Ishaan Singh Khanuja	1240	IND	½	1	1	0	1	0	1	0	0	1	1	6,5	31	40	34,00	U8 Open
3		Ilamparthi A R	1984	IND	1	1	½	1	½	1	1	1	½	0	½	8,0	4	40	-47,20	U10 Open
4		Bharadia Yash	1963	IND	1	1	½	½	½	0	1	1	1	1	½	8,0	6	40	-57,20	U10 Open
14		Mayank Chakraborty	1731	IND	1	1	½	1	1	½	0	1	0	1	1	8,0	7	40	22,00	U10 Open
25		Raghu Ram Reddy Seelam	1631	IND	1	1	½	0	0	½	0	1	½	1	½	6,0	39	40	-50,40	U10 Open
26		Daakshin Arun	1628	IND	1	1	0	1	½	0	0	1	1	1	0	6,5	27	40	-60,00	U10 Open
47		Rajveer Pinkesh Nahar	1410	IND	½	0	1	1	0	½	1	0	0	½	0	4,5	79	40	-22,40	U10 Open
51		Aarav Sinha	1383	IND	0	1	1	½	½	0	½	0	1	0	1	5,5	52	40	34,40	U10 Open
3	CM	Shahil Dey	2207	IND	½	0	½	1	1	1	1	0	0	1	1	7,0	19	40	-112,00	U12 Open
4	CM	Dev Shah	2161	IND	1	1	0	1	1	0	½	½	1	0	0	6,0	36	40	-130,40	U12 Open
17	CM	Kadam Om Manish	2028	IND	1	½	1	1	½	½	0	0	1	½	0	6,0	38	40	-62,40	U12 Open
41		Mahendra Teja Mekala	1827	IND	1	1	1	1	0	0	0	1	1	0	0	6,0	37	40	110,80	U12 Open
75		Bang Atharva	1486	IND	0	1	0	0	1	½	0	1	½	½	1	5,5	64	40	30,40	U12 Open
4		Aishani Pathak	1245	IND	½	0	1	½	0	1	1	0	0	1	1	6,0	31	40	-13,60	U8 Girls
10		Lakshana Subramanian	1159	IND	1	0	1	0	1	1	1	1	0	0	1	7,0	13	40	0,80	U8 Girls
17		Kolagatla Alana Meenakshi	1061	IND	1	½	½	0	1	0	1	1	1	0	1	7,0	15	40	-6,00	U8 Girls
21		Anaishaa Pinkesh Nahar	1033	IND	1	0	½	0	½	1	0	1	1	1	1	7,0	16	40	29,20	U8 Girls
23		Aadhya Jain	1008	IND	0	1	1	1	1	½	1	1	0	0	½	7,0	12	40	76,40	U8 Girls
24		Abhishree Deepu	0	IND	0	1	0	1	0	1	0	0	1	½	0	4,5	60	0	0,00	U8 Girls
58		Samaira Jain	0	IND	0	0	0	1	0	1	½	1	1	0	1	5,5	43	0	0,00	U8 Girls
12		Sneha Halder	1561	IND	1	1	0	0	1	1	0	1	0	1	½	6,5	25	40	-82,40	U10 Girls
27		Indira Priyadharshini Subbu	1346	IND	1	1	0	1	0	0	½	½	1	1	0	6,0	32	40	-35,20	U10 Girls
33		Sachi Jain	1282	IND	1	0	1	0	1	½	1	½	0	½	1	6,5	21	40	98,40	U10 Girls
38		Aswinika Mani R	1242	IND	0	1	0	1	1	1	½	0	0	1	1	6,5	27	40	57,20	U10 Girls
1	WFM	Savitha Shri B	2010	IND	½	1	1	0	1	1	½	1	0	0	1	7,0	12	40	-108,80	U12 Girls
38		Akshaya Rajaraman	1457	IND	1	0	0	1	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	2,0	87	40	-26,80	U12 Girls
42		Tejaswi R	1393	IND	1	0	1	0	½	½	½	0	0	1	1	5,5	50	40	-39,60	U12 Girls
44		Sinthia Sarkar	1384	IND	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0,0	90	40	0,00	U12 Girls

For complete results of all categories click here.

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