Kolkata 2018 Round 7: It's Deep, Short and Srinath!

by Sagar Shah - 21/05/2018

No sole leader has been able to sustain for more than a round at the Kolkata Open 2018. Ivan Rozum raced ahead with 5.0/5, but then lost his game to Adam Tukhaev. Tukhaev with 5.5/6 was the sole leader, but in the seventh round was beaten by Nigel Short in a fine game by the English GM. Deep Sengupta showed his class and outplayed Tajik GM Farrukh Amonatov, while GM Srinath Narayanan was extremely lucky to win his game against Karthikeyan Murali. We have a pictorial report on not just round seven but also on the dinner party that was held after the round.

Why can't GMs win winning positions?

One of the most basic problems faced by chess players all around the world is winning won positions. "The hardest thing in chess is to win won positions!" But you might expect grandmasters to win them, right? After all they spend multiple hours in their lab studying the intricacies of the game trying to understand how to become better at this complex sport. Yet, when they sit opposite their opponent on the board, it is a completely different ball game altogether.

GM Karthikeyan Murali was winning in quite a few ways against Srinath Narayanan, but the two time national champion just couldn't finish off the game and slumped to a defeat. | Photo: Amruta Mokal

In this position Karthikeyan who was black had to just play Kg7 followed by Bb5 and win the game.

GM Lalith Babu (can you guess why he no longer wears his spectacles!) survived a brutal attack on his king by IM S. Nitin. The Intenational Master from Salem was winning the game but Lalith did not give up and was rewarded with the victory. | Photo: Amruta Mokal

It is Black (Nitin) to play. Can you find the fastest way to win?

Caption this! | Photo: Amruta Mokal

Nigel Short managed to win a very nice game against GM Adam Tukhaev | Photo: Amruta Mokal

One does not often see such a pawn chain! | Photo: Amruta Mokal

It was a Sunday and Deep's wife Tania had an off at work and so she came to cheer her husband! Deep rose to the occasion and beat GM Farrukh Amonatov. | Photo: Amruta Mokal

Nihal Sarin played a fantastic game against Sundararajan Kidambi to move to 5.5/7 | Photo: Amruta Mokal

It was not easy, but Nihal had many tricks up his sleeve! | Photo: Amruta Mokal

IM D.Gukesh lost his game against the Vietnamese opponent Nguyen Phuoc Tam | Photo: Amruta Mokal

One of India's top female players Mary Ann Gomes | Photo: Shahid Ahmed

Leon Mendonca continues his great form in the tournament and is now gaining 102 Elo points | Photo: Amruta Mokal

Don't mess with the Rajinikanth! Check out this amazing game between Neelotpal Das and Deepan Chakkravarthy where Deepan was completely lost, but managed to save the game and even win in the end! | Photo: Amruta Mokal

GMs Ivan Rozum and Vladimir Burmakin split points on board three | Photo: Amruta Mokal

Dinner party at the Calcutta Club:

The story has it that the Viceroy during the pre-independence times went to the Bengal club with an Indian friend. Such were the terrible rules that an Indian was not allowed to enter into the premises of that club. Even the viceroy was not allowed to bring his Indian friend. Angered by this treatment, the viceroy decided to build another club where Indians would be given an entry and that was named as the Calcutta Club. It was the venue of the dinner party at the 3rd Kolkata Open 2018 after the seventh round.

Dibyendu Barua sits and discusses with the Chairman of MET Technologies Kunal Gupta | Photo: Amruta Mokal

Nigel Short, of course, entertained his table with his short stories! | Photo: Amruta Mokal

The invited grandmasters were treated to sumptuous food | Photo: Amruta Mokal

Everyone got a chance to catch up with each other! But as we can see chess players will more often than not discuss chess! | Photo: Amruta Mokal

GM Rashit Ziatdinov even brought a chess board to the party! | Photo: Amruta Mokal

GM Andrey Deviatkin was injured and had a leg fracture but he did not withdraw from the tournament and made sure to be a part of the party as well. | Photo: Amruta Mokal

GM Andrey Deviatkin tells us the reason behind his fracture

Ukranian GM Tukhaev and Russian GM Rozum enjoying a nice Indian dinner! | Photo: Amruta Mokal

Two pretty girls Pallabi Roy and Mohana Sengupta in the Indian traditional saree | Photo: Amruta Mokal

The hard working arbiters surely deserved some time off work! | Photo: Amruta Mokal

A lot of things happening in this picture! Can you give it an appropriate caption? | Photo: Amruta Mokal

Sumit Kumar (left) and Sayan Bose (right) have been working day and night to make this event a success! | Photo: Amruta Mokal

The most affable couple in town - Surya and Sudeshna Ganguly | Photo: Amruta Mokal

GMs Nigel Short and Andrey Deviatkin with the organizers and sponsors | Photo: Amruta Mokal

The group picture with the arbiters, organizers and Nigel Short | Photo: Amruta Mokal

Arbiters with Dibyendu and Saheli Barua | Photo: Amruta Mokal

I was quite 'bored' at the party! | Photo: Amruta Mokal

Such parties are quite common in European events, but not so much in India. However, they are extremely important as they give a chance to players to meet the sponsors, talk to them and just unwind in between a hard event. GMs Deepan, Vishnu and Abhijeet taking it easy! | Photo: Amruta Mokal

We asked the grandmasters at the Kolkata Open 2018 as to what makes this event truly special? Here's what they said.

Results of round 7:

Bo.	No.		Name	Rtg	Pts.	Result	Pts.		Name	Rtg	No.
1	1	GM	Short Nigel D	2656	5	1 - 0	5½	GM	Tukhaev Adam	2551	9
2	4	GM	Amonatov Farrukh	2608	5	0 - 1	5	GM	Sengupta Deep	2563	8
3	6	GM	Rozum Ivan	2581	5	½ - ½	5	GM	Burmakin Vladimir	2528	13
4	16	GM	Deepan Chakkravarthy J.	2516	5	½ - ½	5	GM	Sandipan Chanda	2573	7
5	14	GM	Narayanan Srinath	2525	5	1 - 0	4½	GM	Karthikeyan Murali	2617	3
6	10	IM	Nihal Sarin	2551	4½	1 - 0	4½	GM	Sundararajan Kidambi	2434	31
7	12	GM	Lalith Babu M R	2531	4½	1 - 0	4½	IM	Nitin S.	2432	32
8	39	IM	Rahul Srivatshav P	2402	4½	0 - 1	4½	GM	Shyam Sundar M.	2518	15
9	19	GM	Neverov Valeriy	2496	4½	½ - ½	4½	IM	Raghunandan Kaumandur Srihari	2400	41
10	45	IM	Rathnakaran K.	2377	4½	0 - 1	4½	FM	Erigaisi Arjun	2488	21
11	25	IM	Harsha Bharathakoti	2463	4½	½ - ½	4½	IM	Ravi Teja S.	2338	57
12	26	IM	Nguyen Van Huy	2462	4½	½ - ½	4½	IM	Sangma Rahul	2295	68
13	81		Sahoo Utkal Ranjan	2281	4½	½ - ½	4½	IM	Das Sayantan	2437	30
14	2	GM	Gupta Abhijeet	2619	4	1 - 0	4	FM	Ahmed Sk. Nasir	2305	62
15	64	FM	Islam Kh. Aminul	2296	4	½ - ½	4	GM	Vishnu Prasanna. V	2532	11
16	17	GM	Tran Tuan Minh	2512	4	1 - 0	4		Sekar B	2304	63
17	20	GM	Rahman Ziaur	2495	4	1 - 0	4	WGM	Gomes Mary Ann	2290	73
18	82		Neelash Saha	2280	4	½ - ½	4	GM	Neelotpal Das	2452	28
19	29	GM	Laxman R.R.	2444	4	1 - 0	4		Ojas Kulkarni	2251	91
20	33	CM	Gukesh D	2426	4	0 - 1	4		Nguyen Phuoc Tam	2210	100

Standings after round 7:

Rk.	SNo		Name	sex	FED	Rtg	Club/City	Pts.	TB1	TB2	TB3	TB4	TB5	w	we	w-we
1	1	GM	Short Nigel D		ENG	2656	ENG	6,0	0,0	29,0	32,0	27,25	5	6	5,34	0,66
2	14	GM	Narayanan Srinath		IND	2525	AIR INDIA	6,0	0,0	27,0	30,0	25,25	5	6	4,16	1,84
3	8	GM	Sengupta Deep		IND	2563	PSPB	6,0	0,0	27,0	30,0	24,50	6	6	4,64	1,36
4	6	GM	Rozum Ivan		RUS	2581	RUS	5,5	0,0	30,0	33,0	24,75	5	5,5	4,77	0,73
5	9	GM	Tukhaev Adam		UKR	2551	UKR	5,5	0,0	28,5	30,5	22,75	5	5,5	4,68	0,82
6	7	GM	Sandipan Chanda		IND	2573	WB	5,5	0,0	27,5	31,0	24,00	4	5,5	5,12	0,38
7	21	FM	Erigaisi Arjun		IND	2488	TEL	5,5	0,0	26,0	29,0	20,75	5	5,5	4,58	0,92
8	12	GM	Lalith Babu M R		IND	2531	PSPB	5,5	0,0	25,5	28,5	21,50	4	4,5	3,85	0,65
9	15	GM	Shyam Sundar M.		IND	2518	TN	5,5	0,0	25,0	28,5	22,50	4	5,5	5,22	0,28
10	16	GM	Deepan Chakkravarthy J.		IND	2516	RLYS	5,5	0,0	25,0	27,0	20,25	5	5,5	5,16	0,34
11	10	IM	Nihal Sarin		IND	2551	KER	5,5	0,0	24,0	26,5	21,00	4	5,5	5,39	0,11
12	13	GM	Burmakin Vladimir		RUS	2528	RUS	5,5	0,0	23,5	26,0	19,50	4	5,5	4,93	0,57
13	30	IM	Das Sayantan		IND	2437	WB	5,0	0,0	28,0	31,0	22,50	3	5	4,91	0,09
14	20	GM	Rahman Ziaur		BAN	2495	BAN	5,0	0,0	28,0	31,0	19,75	4	4	3,81	0,19
15	4	GM	Amonatov Farrukh		TJK	2608	TJK	5,0	0,0	28,0	30,5	19,75	4	5	5,35	-0,35
16	17	GM	Tran Tuan Minh		VIE	2512	VIE	5,0	0,0	26,0	29,5	19,50	4	5	5,03	-0,03
17	29	GM	Laxman R.R.		IND	2444	RLYS	5,0	0,0	26,0	28,5	18,75	4	5	5,10	-0,10
18	2	GM	Gupta Abhijeet		IND	2619	PSPB	5,0	0,0	26,0	28,5	18,25	4	5	5,70	-0,70
19	57	IM	Ravi Teja S.		IND	2338	RLYS	5,0	0,0	25,5	27,0	17,50	4	4	3,29	0,71
20	41	IM	Raghunandan Kaumandur Srihari		IND	2400	KAR	5,0	0,0	25,0	28,0	19,75	4	5	4,48	0,52

Pairings of round 8:

Bo.	No.		Name	Rtg	Pts.	Result	Pts.		Name	Rtg	No.
1	8	GM	Sengupta Deep	2563	6		6	GM	Narayanan Srinath	2525	14
2	7	GM	Sandipan Chanda	2573	5½		6	GM	Short Nigel D	2656	1
3	15	GM	Shyam Sundar M.	2518	5½		5½	GM	Rozum Ivan	2581	6
4	9	GM	Tukhaev Adam	2551	5½		5½	GM	Deepan Chakkravarthy J.	2516	16
5	13	GM	Burmakin Vladimir	2528	5½		5½	IM	Nihal Sarin	2551	10
6	21	FM	Erigaisi Arjun	2488	5½		5½	GM	Lalith Babu M R	2531	12
7	29	GM	Laxman R.R.	2444	5		5	GM	Gupta Abhijeet	2619	2
8	30	IM	Das Sayantan	2437	5		5	GM	Amonatov Farrukh	2608	4
9	17	GM	Tran Tuan Minh	2512	5		5	IM	Raghunandan Kaumandur Srihari	2400	41
10	57	IM	Ravi Teja S.	2338	5		5	GM	Neverov Valeriy	2496	19
11	20	GM	Rahman Ziaur	2495	5		5	IM	Sangma Rahul	2295	68
12	94		Aradhya Garg	2230	5		5	IM	Harsha Bharathakoti	2463	25
13	26	IM	Nguyen Van Huy	2462	5		5		Sahoo Utkal Ranjan	2281	81
14	11	GM	Vishnu Prasanna. V	2532	4½		5		Nguyen Phuoc Tam	2210	100
15	3	GM	Karthikeyan Murali	2617	4½		4½	IM	Rathnakaran K.	2377	45
16	52		Kaustuv Kundu	2360	4½		4½	IM	Vignesh N R	2485	22
17	23	IM	Iniyan P	2469	4½		4½	FM	Rajdeep Sarkar	2355	54
18	27	IM	Khusenkhojaev Muhammad	2456	4½		4½		Srijit Paul	2347	55
19	28	GM	Neelotpal Das	2452	4½		4½	WIM	Vaishali R	2316	60
20	132		Manigandan S S	2128	4½		4½	GM	Sundararajan Kidambi	2434	31

Articles related to the tournament:

Live Games from 3rd International Open Grandmasters Chess Tournament 2018

FIDE Presidential candidate GM Nigel Short headlines LIC 3rd Kolkata Open 2018

Round 1: Short's last holiday event before campaign

Round 2: Vantika Agrawal shows how to beat a 2600+ GM

Round 3: And then there were eight

Round 4: Gukesh beats Aravindh Chithambaram

Round 5: Ivan Rozum shows you what the art of being means

Round 6: Momentary lapse in concentration costs Rozum the full point