Mrudul Dehankar dominates under-18 girls!
Mrudul Dehankar has been paired up against Rindhiya V in the final round and she only needs a draw to clinch the under-18 girls title! | Photo: Gopakumar Sudhakaran
Apart from drawing against Jyothsna L. in the fifth round, Mrudul Dehankar has so far won seven out of her eight games. In the last two rounds victory came against Srimathi R and National under-17 champion Samriddhaa Ghosh.
Mrudul (left) in action against Srimathi R in round seven | Photo: Gopakumar Sudhakaran
Mrudul had the white pieces against Srimathi and she employed her pet Trompowsky attack after a queen's pawn opening. The former was probably not prepared in this line as she chose a rather unusual and perhaps even dubious 3...b6 variation.
Mrudul Dehankar - Srimathi R, Round 7
There are only eight games with 3...b6 in the online database, all of which resulting in win for White.
With 12.Qe2 itself Mrudul's position started to look convincing. White was prepared to castle long and lash out with h2-h4 on the kingside, while Black was still lagging behind in development.
Mrudul actually missed her way at one point and ended up giving away most of her advantage, yet her opponent couldn't make good use of the opportunity and crumbled in just 37 moves.
Mrudul had the black pieces against Samriddha Ghosh in round eight. The game started off with an English and the position was roughly equal throughout until the latter blundered.
Samriddhaa Ghosh - Mrudul Dehankar, Round 8
The position was perfectly balanced upto this point. A move like 22.Qf3 aiming for further simplification would have been fine but Samriddhaa went pawn grabbing with 22.Qxc7 ... Can you find how Mrudul took advantage of this?
Standings in under-18 girls after penultimate round
| Rk. | SNo | Name | sex | FED | Rtg | Pts. | TB1 | TB2 | TB3 | TB4 | TB5 | w-we | ||
| 1 | 1 | WCM | Mrudul Dehankar | w | IND | 2198 | 7,5 | 0,0 | 7 | 34,0 | 37,0 | 34,25 | 1,14 | |
| 2 | 2 | Priyanka K | w | IND | 2169 | 6,5 | 0,0 | 6 | 35,5 | 38,5 | 28,25 | 0,03 | ||
| 3 | 4 | WCM | Jyothsna L | w | IND | 1989 | 5,5 | 0,0 | 3 | 35,5 | 39,5 | 25,75 | 0,74 | |
| 4 | 6 | Pandey Srishti | w | IND | 1928 | 5,0 | 0,0 | 4 | 34,5 | 36,0 | 18,00 | 0,61 | ||
| 5 | 8 | Toshali V | w | IND | 1823 | 5,0 | 0,0 | 4 | 34,0 | 35,5 | 16,75 | 1,23 | ||
| 6 | 12 | Rindhiya V | w | IND | 1753 | 4,5 | 0,0 | 4 | 32,0 | 34,0 | 15,50 | 1,17 | ||
| 7 | 13 | Shriya R Revankar | w | IND | 1751 | 4,5 | 0,0 | 3 | 28,0 | 30,5 | 15,25 | 0,61 | ||
| 8 | 15 | Mudaliar Nandini | w | IND | 1518 | 4,5 | 0,0 | 2 | 26,5 | 28,5 | 13,50 | 1,23 | ||
| 9 | 7 | Ghosh Samriddhaa | w | IND | 1863 | 4,0 | 0,0 | 3 | 34,5 | 36,5 | 13,00 | 0,10 | ||
| 10 | 3 | WFM | Sanskriti Goyal | w | IND | 2030 | 4,0 | 0,0 | 3 | 33,5 | 35,5 | 13,75 | -1,45 |
Srijit topples Thilakarathne to take sole lead
After losing to Srijit Paul in the penultimate round Thilakarathne G M H of Sri Lanka has slipped to the third place on the leaderboard. He has 5.5/8 points along with Mohamed Anees M and Abdurakhmonov Mukhammadali | Photo: Gopakumar Sudhakaran
Standings in under-18 open after penultimate round
| Rk. | SNo | Name | Typ | sex | FED | Rtg | Pts. | TB1 | TB2 | TB3 | TB4 | TB5 | w-we | ||
| 1 | 2 | Srijit Paul | U18 | IND | 2310 | 6,5 | 0,0 | 6 | 36,0 | 40,5 | 32,50 | 0,53 | |||
| 2 | 6 | FM | Abdilkhair Abilmansur | U16 | KAZ | 2189 | 6,0 | 0,0 | 5 | 33,0 | 36,5 | 27,00 | 0,32 | ||
| 3 | 1 | FM | Thilakarathne G M H | U18 | SRI | 2397 | 5,5 | 0,0 | 5 | 36,0 | 39,5 | 26,00 | -1,20 | ||
| 4 | 14 | Mohamed Anees M | U16 | IND | 2038 | 5,5 | 0,0 | 5 | 35,0 | 38,0 | 24,50 | 1,88 | |||
| 5 | 3 | FM | Abdurakhmonov Mukhammadali | U18 | UZB | 2288 | 5,5 | 0,0 | 5 | 31,5 | 34,5 | 22,50 | -1,10 | ||
| 6 | 9 | FM | Vatsal Singhania | U18 | IND | 2159 | 5,0 | 0,0 | 4 | 36,0 | 39,5 | 22,75 | 0,27 | ||
| 7 | 12 | Harisurya Bharadwaj Gundepudi | U18 | IND | 2043 | 5,0 | 0,0 | 4 | 31,0 | 34,0 | 20,25 | -0,19 | |||
| 8 | 24 | Esshan Wadhawan | U16 | IND | 1903 | 5,0 | 0,0 | 4 | 31,0 | 34,0 | 18,50 | 1,68 | |||
| 9 | 19 | Gaurav Rajesh Zagade | U18 | IND | 2012 | 5,0 | 0,0 | 4 | 30,5 | 33,0 | 18,00 | 0,82 | |||
| 10 | 5 | FM | Ajay Karthikeyan | U16 | IND | 2206 | 5,0 | 0,0 | 3 | 34,5 | 38,0 | 22,25 | 0,12 |
Under-20 girls: Sakshi in joint lead,Vantika just half a point behind
Sakshi Chitlange won both her games in rounds seven and eight to join Bakhora Abdusattorova on the lead with 6.5/8 points | Photo: Gopakumar Sudhakaran
Vantika had to be contented with double draws in the last two rounds. Hence, she has slipped behind the leaders with 6.0/8 points | Photo: Gopakumar Sudhakaran
Standings in under-20 girls after penultimate round
| Rk. | SNo | Name | sex | FED | Rtg | Pts. | TB1 | TB2 | TB3 | TB4 | TB5 | w-we | ||
| 1 | 5 | WIM | Abdusattorova Bakhora | w | UZB | 2109 | 6,5 | 1,0 | 6 | 35,0 | 39,0 | 30,50 | 1,21 | |
| 2 | 4 | WIM | Chitlange Sakshi | w | IND | 2159 | 6,5 | 0,0 | 6 | 34,5 | 38,0 | 29,00 | 0,90 | |
| 3 | 1 | WIM | Vantika Agrawal | w | IND | 2304 | 6,0 | 0,0 | 5 | 34,0 | 36,5 | 25,50 | -0,61 | |
| 4 | 13 | Shah Vishwa | w | IND | 1760 | 5,0 | 0,0 | 4 | 35,5 | 38,5 | 20,75 | 3,07 | ||
| 5 | 9 | Bakshi Rutuja | w | IND | 2002 | 5,0 | 0,0 | 3 | 34,0 | 36,5 | 19,50 | 1,65 | ||
| 6 | 17 | Senthamizh Yazhini S | w | IND | 1626 | 4,5 | 0,0 | 4 | 30,0 | 32,0 | 14,00 | 2,16 | ||
| 7 | 6 | WFM | Savitha Shri B | w | IND | 2076 | 4,5 | 0,0 | 4 | 27,5 | 29,0 | 15,00 | -1,96 | |
| 8 | 2 | WIM | Aakanksha Hagawane | w | IND | 2232 | 4,5 | 0,0 | 3 | 34,5 | 37,0 | 17,00 | -2,15 | |
| 9 | 7 | WFM | Jain Nityata | w | IND | 2069 | 4,5 | 0,0 | 3 | 28,0 | 30,5 | 15,75 | -1,55 | |
| 10 | 8 | WFM | Bommini Mounika Akshaya | w | IND | 2055 | 4,0 | 1,5 | 3 | 32,5 | 34,5 | 14,50 | -1,27 |
Under-20 open: Can Rajdeep Sarkar catch up with the leader?
Rajdeep Sarkar (left) beat Pranav Anand (right) in the seventh round and drew Leon Mendonca in the eighth. He is just half a point behind the leader Abdimalik Abdisalimov with 6.5/8 | Photo: Gopakumar Sudhakaran
Leon Mendonca has 5.5/8 points along with Divya Deshmukh and Harshal Shahi | Photo: Gopakumar Sudhakaran
Divya Deshmukh suffered her first defeat of the event in round eight against Abdimalik Abdisalimov | Photo: Gopakumar Sudhakaran
In round 7 however Divya registered a fine victory against Sammed Jaykumar Shette. The latter had the black pieces and opted for the Dutch Leningrad against 1.d4
Divya Deshmukh - Sammed Jaykumar Shette, Round 7
Position after 27...Bc8: Black could have chosen a more active continuation with 27...Qf6 instead. This allowed White to win a clear pawn with advantage.
The final blunder came only one move later with 28...Rd2 - once again 28...Qf6 would have been better - can you finish off Black from here like Divya did? Check the game below for answer.
Standings in under-20 open after penultimate round
| Rk. | SNo | Name | sex | FED | Rtg | Pts. | TB1 | TB2 | TB3 | TB4 | TB5 | w-we | ||
| 1 | 2 | FM | Abdisalimov Abdimalik | UZB | 2409 | 7,0 | 0,0 | 6 | 37,0 | 41,0 | 35,50 | 1,57 | ||
| 2 | 7 | FM | Rajdeep Sarkar | IND | 2364 | 6,5 | 0,0 | 5 | 36,0 | 39,5 | 31,00 | 1,79 | ||
| 3 | 19 | FM | Harshal Shahi | IND | 2114 | 5,5 | 0,0 | 5 | 35,0 | 37,0 | 22,25 | 2,78 | ||
| 4 | 5 | IM | Mendonca Leon Luke | IND | 2385 | 5,5 | 0,0 | 4 | 35,5 | 39,0 | 24,00 | -0,20 | ||
| 5 | 8 | WIM | Divya Deshmukh | w | IND | 2362 | 5,5 | 0,0 | 4 | 34,5 | 37,5 | 24,75 | 0,10 | |
| 6 | 3 | Sammed Jaykumar Shete | IND | 2395 | 5,0 | 0,0 | 4 | 36,0 | 40,0 | 23,25 | -0,31 | |||
| 7 | 15 | Saurabh Anand | IND | 2216 | 5,0 | 0,0 | 4 | 34,0 | 37,0 | 20,50 | 1,10 | |||
| 8 | 9 | FM | Pranav Anand | IND | 2361 | 5,0 | 0,0 | 4 | 33,5 | 37,5 | 21,75 | 0,00 | ||
| 9 | 6 | Sankalp Gupta | IND | 2376 | 5,0 | 0,0 | 4 | 31,5 | 34,5 | 19,25 | -1,15 | |||
| 10 | 17 | Aradhya Garg | IND | 2157 | 5,0 | 0,0 | 3 | 33,0 | 36,0 | 21,25 | 2,24 |
Check complete results of all categories here.
