Kolkata Open Chess: Vidit beats Abdulla to join Kunte in lead

Kolkata: Former Under 14 world champion and Indian grandmaster Vidit Santosh Gujrathi joined his compatriot GM Abhijit Kunte in the lead with five points after the sixth round of the 6th Kolkata Open (19th International Open GM Chess Tournament) here Sunday.Five players are in the second spot, grabbing 4.5 points each.GM Al Rakib Abdulla of Bangladesh adopted Nimzo Indian defence against Vidit and the game went on expected lines. In move 19, Vidit doubled his rooks, and Abdulla exchanged one of them to minimise the Indian's attack. But Vidit made a stunning rook sacrifice on the 23rd move, leading to a knight fork of Abdulla's king and queen. Abdulla resigned immediately.On the top board, Kunte again played it safe to keep the lead, holding the Philippines grandmaster Oliver Barbosa to a draw in 25 moves of an English opening.[caption id="attachment_1447469" align="alignleft" width="380"] Representative image of Chess Board. AFP[/caption]The second board game between Pantsulaia Levan of Georgia and Ziaur Rahman of Bangladesh also ended with a similar result, but it lasted 44 moves.Top seeded Nigel Short of England could not wriggle out of his poor form, as Oriisa's international master Swayams Mishra forced him to concede his third draw in six games to less stronger opponents.Second seeded Sergey Fedorchuk of Russia got the better of Asian Junior champion IM N Srinath and fourth seeded Mchedlishvili Mikheil outwitted former national under 17 champion P Shyam Nikil.Important results of Sixth roundKunte Abhijit IND 5 drew with Barbosa Oliver PHI 4 1/2Pantsulaia Levan GEO 4 1/2 drew with Rahman Ziaur BAN 4 1/2Vidit Santosh Gujrathi IND 5 beat Abdulla Al-Rakib BAN 4Deepan Chakkravarthy J. IND 4 1/2 drew with Sethuraman S.P. IND 4Debashis Das IND 3 1/2 lost to Landa Konstantin RUS 4 1/2Haznedaroglu Kivanc TUR 4 drew with Adhiban B. IND 4Swayams Mishra IND 3 1/2 drew with Short Nigel D. ENG 3 1/2Fedorchuk Sergey A. UKR 4 beat Narayanan Srinath IND 3Mchedlishvili Mikheil GEO 4 beat Shyam Nikil P. IND 3Ly Moulthun AUS 3 lost to Lalith Babu M.R.IND 4Grigoryan Avetik ARM 4 beat Swapnil S. Dhopade IND 3Gopal G.N. IND 3 1/2 drew with Prasanna Raghuram Rao IND 3 1/2Abhishek Kelkar IND 3 lost to Sengupta Deep IND 4Shyam Sundar M. IND 4 beat Neelotpal Das IND 3Ghosh Diptayan IND 4 beat Krishna C.R.G. IND 3IANS