IMAGE: Image used for representational purposes. Photograph: International Chess Federation/Instagram
Playing the game of his life, India’s Harshit Pawar shocked top seed and youngest ever Grandmaster Abhimanyu Mishra in the first round of World Junior Chess Championship, in Gandhinagar, on Sunday.
While the day was not devoid of upsets, Pawar was the star, especially as he did everything right from the early middle game against the young American opponent.
It was a Bogo Indian by Pawar as black wherein Mishra was first to go against the black king with a pawn sacrifice in the center.
As it happened, Mishra won a rook for knight but Pawar had a cluster of pawns in the center that gave him compensation. Mishra’s King also got stuck in the center to make matters worse for the American and eventually black was able to crash through white’s defenses.
After the first round, as many as 51 players emerged with a perfect score and Artiom Stribuk of Russia was the only other major casualty in the day as he was beaten by V S Nandish.
In the girls’ section, top seed Divya Deshmukh started of with an expected victory over Anupam M Sreekumar. The second highest rated Indian, Rakshitha Ravi defeated compatriot G Shivamshika to match Divya on points.
The event that was inaugurated by five-time world champion Viswanathan Anand will have 11 rounds before the best player in the under-20 category can be determined in both sections.
It may be recalled that many of the top juniors of the world like D Gukesh and R Praggnanandhaa have decided to give this year’s event a miss as they are already in the elite chess circles.
Praggnanandhaaa is training his sights to win the Norway Chess tournament ahead of top stalwarts of the world while Gukesh will be fighting for the world championship match to be held later this year.
Important and Indian results round 1 open (Indians unless stated): Abhimanyu Mishra (USA) lost to Harshit Pawar; Sushanth Kamabathula lost to Alexey Grebnev (Rus); Pranav Anand beat Alekhya Mukhopadhyay; Siddharth Jagadeesh (Sgp) beat Yash Bharadia; Jam Subelj (Slo,) beat Jval Saurin Patel; Aaditya Dhingra drew with Siddharth Singh (USA); Kartik Kumar Singh drew with Mamikon Gharibyan (Arm); Yerlan Tleukhanov (Kaz) lost to Aditya Samant; Lika Budisavljevic (Srb) beat Dilip Bhoir Paras; Sriansh Das lost to Marius Fromm (Ger); Saryyev Azym (Tkm) lost to A R Ilamparthi; Tran Gia Phuc (Vie) beat Kushagra Jain; Danis Kuandykuly (Kaz) lost to Prraneeth Vuppala; Mayank Chakraborty beat Jai Sankar Subramanian; V S Nandish beat Artiom Stribuk (Fid); Ethan Vaz drew with Akshat Sureka; Manas Gaikwad lost to Arsen Davtyan (Arm); L Srihari beat Jihan Tejas Shah; Ayushh Ravikumar lost to Wafa Hamed (Egy); Anuj Shrivatri beat Swarna Nihal; Daksh Goyal beat Ozenir Ekin Baris (Tur); Nosh Fecker drew with Jeet Shah; Mrinmoy Rajkhowa drew with Jares Michal (Cze); Sri Charan Sandipagu beat De Silva L M S T (Sri); Sambit Panda beat Arul Prakash; Jyotshnav Talukdar lost to Sanket Chakravarty; Insara S D Nadev (Sri) lost to S Aswath; S Rohith lost to Shahil Dey; Sharnarthi Shloklost to Manish Anto Cristiano; Adireddy Arjun beat Alhejab Meshal (Kuw); Guru Prakash beat Simone Pozzari (Ita); S Harshad beat Mankga Thabang (Rsa); Boricha Yohan lost to Avinash Ramesh; Vengatesh Krishnan lost to Vrashank Chouhan; Mukund Hemant Agarwal beat Vaibhav Bedi.
Girls: Anupam M Sreekumar lost to Divya Deshmukh; Mariam Mkrtchyan (Arm) beat S Padmini; Rakshitta Ravi beat G Shivamshika; Trisha Kanyamarala (Irl) lost to Akshaya Sathi; Saparya Ghoshbeat Kirtadze Anastasia (Geo); Kaldarova Ayaulym (Kaz) beat Anushka Gupta; Saniya Rafique Tadavi beat Mrittika Mallick; Ashita Jain beat Nia Donghvani (Geo); G Tejaswini beat Siya Sagar; Yashvi Jain beat Swara Lakshmi S Nair; Anishka Vikram beat Deepak Laksshana (Can); Arya G Mallar beat Mrudul Dehankar; Drishtee Ghosh beat Kheerthi Ganta; V Rindhiya beat Kriti Mayur Patel; Modipalli Deekshitha beat Nagyova Daniela (Cze); Sneha Halder beat Varshita Jain; Sherali Pattnaik beat U A Disha; Riya Mishra lost to Shubhi Gupta; Bhagyashree Patil beat Aashi Upadhyay; Falak Joni Naik lost to Khairmode Dhanashree; Ishvi Aggarwal beat Radhika Sharma; Asudani Ruhani Raj lost to Dakshita Kumawat; Arshiya Das beat Prakash Vaishnavi; S Pranavasri lost to Marium Fatima; Bristy Mukherjee beat Saule Cumacenko (Ltu); Advika Sarupria beat Benito De Leo Estefania (Mex); S Kanishka beat Riya Banker.
