Five-including 4 from Tamil Nadu-share lead at Senior Nationals Chess

Harpal Singh Bedi 

Five Players – Including four from  Tamil Nadu -GM Gukesh D ; GM Iniyan P, GM Aravindh Chithambaram  IM Pranav V  and Arjun Erigaisi of Telangana  all with 6.5 points-  each shared the lead at the end of the eighth round the MPL 58^th Senior National Chess Championship at Ganges Club,  in Kanpur today.

With just three rounds remaining , the thirty lakh prize money event  is heading for an exciting  finish..

In the crucial eighth round on this morning,  P Iniyan outwitted top seed B Adhiban while  P Pranav shocked seasoned campaigner GM Deep Sengupta to join Erigaisi Arjun and Gukesh D in the top point table along with defending champion Aravindh Chithambaram, who beat Railwayman Sayantan Das in the eighth round encounter.

Overnight joint leaders GMs Arjun Erigaisi and D Gukesh signed the peace treaty with Visakh N R and Lalith Babu M R respectively which enabled Iniyan, Pranav and Aravindh to catch up the leaders with contrasting wins in the eighth round.

In other important encounters, GMs  Mitrabha Guha and Aryan Chopra agreed to split the points while commonwealth champion Abhijeet Gupta beat Nitin S of Railways. Mitrabha,

Aryan and Abhijeet are now trailing behind the leaders with a drift of half point along with Lalith Babu M R, Visakh N R,  Swapnil Dhopade and Aditya Mittal. Swapnil got the better of IM Srijit Paul of West Bengal while Adiya registered victory over Srihari L R of Tamil Nadu in the eighth round battle.

. Other important Results:-

Round – 8; GM Mitrabha Guha of West Bengal (6) drew with GM Aryan Chopra of Delhi (6); IM Nitin S of Railways (5) lost to GM Abhijeet Gupta of PSPB (6); IM Himal Gusain of Railways (5.5) drew with GM Sethuraman S P of PSPB (5.5);

IM Srijit Paul of West Bengal (5) lost to GM Swapnil Dhopade of Railways (6); IM Aditya Mittal of Maharashtra (6) beat IM Srihari L R of Tamil Nadu (5); IM Sammed Jaykumar Shete of Maharashtra (5.5) drew with IM Aronyak Ghosh of West Bengal (5.5); IM Koustav Chatterjee of West Bengal (5.5) drew with IM K Ratnakaran of Railways (5.5); Sambit Panda of Odisha (5.5) drew with GM Laxman R R of Railways (5.5);