Gibraltar 2018: Prithu Gupta becomes an IM and scores his maiden GM norm

by Sagar Shah - 01/02/2018

It was a dream come true for the 13-year-old Delhi youngster Prithu Gupta as he not only scored his maiden GM norm at the Gibraltar Masters 2018, but also completed his IM title! The other good news for the day was Raunak Sadhwani making his 2nd IM norm. Debashis Das is showing some super-solid chess with a 2700+ performance, Abhijeet Gupta beat Vassily Ivanchuk with a scintillating game of chess. And last but not the least, Nihal Sarin played an amazing positional game to outwit experienced GM Kiril Georgiev. This report is filled with great insights, analysis, photos and much more!

Sadhwani scores IM norm, Debashis' 2700+ performance, Abhijeet beats Ivanchuk!

The hero of the day: Prithu Gupta - achieving his maiden GM norm and IM title | Photo: John Saunders

Let's first begin with one of the biggest news of the day. After the seventh round Prithu Gupta was sitting pretty with two wins and five draws and a rating performance of 2639. He needed just 1.0/2 and that would have got him his maiden GM norm. But good things don't come so easy! Prithu lost his eighth round and was now in a must-win scenario in the ninth round. He was up against the strong Norwegian IM Johan-Sebastien Christiansen with the black pieces. "I never imagined that I would win the game with black," said Prithu. But he did! And with it, he not only made his maiden GM norm, but also completed his IM title.

"I don't care about tomorrow!" Prithu in conversation with Tania Sachdev after he achieved his GM norm

ChessBase India was the first one to discover Prithu's talent when our author Jitendra Choudhary wrote an article: From 1187 to 2219 in just three years. 13-year-old Prithu is currently ranked number three in India in the under-14 section behind Nihal Sarin and R. Praggnanandhaa. It will be interesting to follow Gupta's career, as he is ideally placed with an IM title and one GM norm. Being coached by able trainers like IM Roktim Bandhopadhyay, IM Somak Palit and GM Saptarshi Roy Chowdhury we can expect much more from this Delhi youngster.

12-year-old Raunak Sadhwani drew his ninth round game against Erik Blomqvist and achieved his second IM norm! | Photo: John Saunders

Sethuraman was playing on board three against Levon Aronian. He got a good position out of the opening, but after that Levon took over and won the game in style! | Photo: John Saunders

Levon tells us about his win over Sethuraman and how good players usually pick up slowly in such open events!

Abhijeet Gupta is the highest ranked Indian currently with 6.5/9. He is in the eighth position. In the eighth round he beat Vassily Ivanchuk. Let's have a look at that game. | Photo: John Saunders

In this line of the Queen's Indian Abhijeet's play was so amazing that I am left wondering where exactly did Ivanchuk (black) go wrong. The Indian GM played these very strong ideas with h4-Bg5, Nd2. I urge the reader to go deeper into this line which according to me looks clearly favourable for White.

One of the other reasons why I was fascinated with this opening is because I had seen it in Daniel King's Power play two. The DVD is entitled "Attacking the king". And this entire idea of exchanging the light squared bishops with Ba6 by Black and then White playing his rook to d1 so that he can recapure with Rxd3 lifting his rook to the third rank was all so fascinating that I couldn't help but fall in love with this opening. Now that I am older (less hair) and more experienced, I know that it wasn't just the opening, but the way Daniel King explained these concepts that made me love this line so much! If you want to learn the art of building up an attack I recommend Power Play 2 to you. Your money won't be wasted!

Coming back to Abhijeet vs Ivanchuk, Gupta played a very beautiful combination:

First of all, Abhijeet played the pawn to d5. Ivanchuk picked it up with his rook. What had Abhijeet prepared?

Nxe6! Bam!

Ivanchuk: Buddy what do you have in mind? My rook on d5 is hanging, but isn't yours on e1 also en prise?

The Gupta touch! I do not need to say anything more! After Kxg8 Qxd5 Black loses a lot of material!

After his win against Ivanchuk, Abhijeet drew with Boris Gelfand. He was worse in the game, but he hung in there. He now faced Polish youngster Duda in the last round | Photo: John Saunders

Nihal Sarin didn't have a great start to the event, but in the ninth round he drew against GM Sandipan Chanda. Much more impressive was his feat in the eighth round. | Photo: John Saunders

Kiril Georgiev is an extremely experienced player, but the way Nihal defeated him was just amazing! In complete positional style! If you didn't see the names, you would be excused for thinking that it was Georgiev who had the white pieces! | Photo: John Saunders

Black has just moved back his queen to e7. How should White continue?

Nihal Sarin analyzes his win over Kiril Georgiev

Venkatesh has been playing very well at this event win two wins over strong GMs Niclas Huschenbeth and Tamas Banusz | Photo: John Saunders

After his win over GM Gopal in the seventh round Pragg had excellent chances to score his second GM norm... | Photo: John Saunders

...but he lost to Sethuraman in the eighth round. With 5.5/9 he has lost his chance to score his norm, because he needs 7.0/10. | Photo: John Saunders

Sethuraman speaks about his win over Praggnanandhaa

Hemant Sharma needs a win in the final round to make his 10 round GM norm. He is up against Nitzan Steinberg (2512) of Israel. | Photo: John Saunders

Debashis Das has been a rock solid performer at this event, scoring 6.0/9. He has remained unbeaten and has a rating performance of 2700+. He has scored wins over Navara and Iturrizaga. | Photo: John Saunders

Tania Sachdev interviews Harikrishna:

From Pratipadu to Belgrade. An interview with India number two Pentala Harikrishna

Get to know Tania better!

Overview of Indian performances

SNo		Name	Rtg	FED	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	Pts.	Rk.	Group
5	GM	Harikrishna P.	2745	IND	½	½	1	1	1	½	0	0	1	5,5	59	Masters
25	GM	Sethuraman S.P.	2646	IND	1	1	½	½	0	1	1	1	0	6,0	24	Masters
31	GM	Gupta Abhijeet	2610	IND	1	½	½	1	1	½	½	1	½	6,5	8	Masters
37	GM	Gopal G.N.	2593	IND	½	1	½	1	½	½	0	1	½	5,5	67	Masters
42	GM	Sandipan Chanda	2579	IND	½	½	1	1	1	1	0	½	½	6,0	29	Masters
45	GM	Narayanan S. L.	2573	IND	1	1	½	½	1	0	1	½	½	6,0	33	Masters
63	GM	Lalith Babu M R	2542	IND	1	1	½	½	0	½	1	0	1	5,5	54	Masters
68	GM	Swapnil S. Dhopade	2533	IND	1	1	½	0	½	1	½	½	1	6,0	39	Masters
71	IM	Nihal Sarin	2524	IND	1	½	½	0	½	1	1	1	½	6,0	45	Masters
74	IM	Praggnanandhaa R	2515	IND	1	½	½	½	½	1	1	0	½	5,5	63	Masters
81	GM	Debashis Das	2501	IND	1	1	½	½	½	½	½	½	1	6,0	20	Masters
82	GM	Gagare Shardul	2494	IND	1	1	½	½	1	0	0	1	½	5,5	48	Masters
102	IM	Prasanna Raghuram Rao	2458	IND	1	0	1	1	0	½	½	1	½	5,5	65	Masters
108	GM	Venkatesh M.R.	2445	IND	1	1	½	½	½	0	1	½	½	5,5	53	Masters
114	IM	Swayams Mishra	2432	IND	1	½	1	0	½	0	½	½	½	4,5	130	Masters
119	IM	Raja Harshit	2427	IND	½	1	½	0	½	1	0	1	½	5,0	110	Masters
136	IM	Mohammad Nubairshah Shaikh	2380	IND	1	½	½	½	1	0	½	½	1	5,5	62	Masters
139	FM	Prithu Gupta	2373	IND	½	½	1	1	½	½	½	0	1	5,5	52	Masters
149	IM	Hemant Sharma (Del)	2348	IND	½	0	1	1	½	½	½	½	½	5,0	80	Masters
159	IM	Padmini Rout	2325	IND	0	1	0	1	1	0	½	1	0	4,5	126	Masters
162	FM	Sadhwani Raunak	2321	IND	½	0	1	½	½	½	1	0	½	4,5	125	Masters
176	IM	Mohota Nisha	2269	IND	½	0	1	½	0	1	1	0	½	4,5	133	Masters
186	WIM	Nandhidhaa Pv	2238	IND	0	1	½	0	1	0	1	½	1	5,0	118	Masters
228	WFM	Cholleti Sahajasri	2083	IND	0	0	1	1	0	1	0	0	0	3,0	224	Masters
230	WIM	Tejaswini Sagar	2081	IND	½	½	½	1	0	0	½	0	1	4,0	173	Masters
247	WIM	Gagare Shalmali	2001	IND	½	0	0	0	1	½	0	½	½	3,0	232	Masters
254	CM	Dev Shah	1977	IND	½	0	0	0	0	1	0	0	1	2,5	257	Masters
268		Mayank Pal	1834	IND	½	0	0	0	½	½	½	½	½	3,0	246	Masters

Rank after Round 9

Rk.	SNo		Name	FED	Rtg	Pts.	TB1
1	3	GM	Nakamura Hikaru	USA	2781	7,0	2830
2	2	GM	Vachier-Lagrave Maxime	FRA	2793	7,0	2771
3	12	GM	Rapport Richard	HUN	2700	7,0	2765
4	1	GM	Aronian Levon	ARM	2797	7,0	2748
5	15	GM	Dubov Daniil	RUS	2694	7,0	2703
6	16	GM	Howell David W L	ENG	2682	6,5	2766
7	38	GM	Antipov Mikhail Al.	RUS	2588	6,5	2757
8	31	GM	Gupta Abhijeet	IND	2610	6,5	2734
9	24	GM	Grandelius Nils	SWE	2647	6,5	2727
10	9	GM	Duda Jan-Krzysztof	POL	2724	6,5	2725
11	10	GM	Wang Hao	CHN	2711	6,5	2720
12	33	GM	Oparin Grigoriy	RUS	2607	6,5	2715
13	7	GM	Vitiugov Nikita	RUS	2732	6,5	2698
14	11	GM	Adams Michael	ENG	2709	6,5	2692
15	14	GM	Gelfand Boris	ISR	2697	6,5	2680
16	32	GM	Vocaturo Daniele	ITA	2609	6,5	2677
17	6	GM	Le Quang Liem	VIE	2737	6,5	2667
18	13	GM	Cheparinov Ivan	BUL	2699	6,5	2637
19	93	GM	Kobo Ori	ISR	2477	6,5	2629
20	81	GM	Debashis Das	IND	2501	6,0	2704