Sahaj Grover scored an upset win against Swedish Grandmaster Tiger Hillarp Persson in the third round of the Kolkata Open chess competition on Thursday. The 14-year-old, who had beaten Bangladeshi GM Reefat Bin Sattar in the previous round, is among a pack of 12 players occupying the second place with 2.5 points.
GM P Magesh Chandran beat 10th seed GM Rauf Mamedov of Azerbaijan with black pieces on the third board to join a group of five players on the top of the table with a tally of three points. Sandipan Chanda was the other Indian in the leading pack which includes Nigel Short, who posted another commanding win.
Adding to the growing list of Indian teenagers doing well against superior opponents in this competition, Grover opted for the Sicilian Defence with black pieces and took advantage of a mistake by Persson in the middlegame.
“Till that time, he (Persson) had a slight advantage,” said Grover. “But he blundered by losing a rook in exchange for a knight and it became easy for me after that.” This was his third win over a GM this year, having beaten Romanian Viorel Ioreachescu in Dubai.
French GM has too much to drink
{{/usCountry}}French GM has too much to drink
{{/usCountry}}GM Vladislav Tkachiev of France raised quite a few eyebrows in the playing hall when he stepped in inebriated for his game against Praveen Kumar.
He was so badly under the influence of alcohol that he could hardly sit on his chair and after 11 moves, fell asleep resting his head on the table.
Attempts to wake him up proved futile and the game was awarded to the Indian on the technical ground of Tkachiev being unable to complete his moves within the stipulated time of an hour and 30 minutes.
He was warned and reprimanded by the organisers afterwards but allowed to take part in the remainder of the competition.