Chennai Open 2019 Round 8: Lugovskoy maintains sole lead, untitled Pranesh shocks Nitin

by Shahid Ahmed - 23/01/2019

GM Maxim Lugovskoy maintained his half-point lead when he defeated GM Stupak Kirill and took his score to 7.5/8 at the conclusion of round 8 in 11th Chennai Open 2019. Kirill blundered in a seemingly equal Rook and minor piece endgame. Recently concluded Delhi Open 2019 winner GM Levan Pantsulaia sacrificed a piece early in the middle game for an initiative against GM Karthik Venkataraman. He endured a turmoil to convert it into a win. Levan is the only player trailing behind the leader by a half-point. 13-year old untitled Pranesh M claimed his second IM victim of the tournament when he defeated Nitin S. Pranesh still has chances of scoring his maiden IM norm. Photo: Amruta Mokal

13-year old Pranesh defeats his second IM of the tournament

Pranesh might chew a pen on the surface, but in his mind he is cooking up ways to chew up his opponents | Photo: Amruta Mokal

Before we see what Pranesh did in this tournament, let's take a quick look of what he did last year:

Pranesh showcases his game to IM Sagar Shah after defeating the super strong IM Rathnakaran K

Now let's see how he fared in the 11th Chennai Open 2019 so far:

Pranesh has defeated IM Rathnakaran K and IM Nitin S. He drew with GM Manik Mikulas and IM Rajesh V A V. That is definitely an impressive performance.

Pranesh is going to face GM Erigaisi Arjun in the penultimate round. Despite Nitin trying to surprise him, Pranesh played a fine game in round 8 and took chances whenever an opportunity presented itself.

Nitin played 20.Bd6. How would you like to continue here with black?

GM Stupak Kirill blundered GM Maxim Lugovskoy in a seemingly equal Rook and minor piece endgame in round 8 | Photo: R R Vasudevan

In QGD Exchange variation, Maxim managed to equalize easily with the black pieces. He might have a couple of tempi in the middle game, but it wasn't possible to gain anything for it. Eventually the game arised into an equal Rook and minor piece endgame where Stupak blundered and lost the game.

GM Levan Pantsulaia continued his momentum with a win over GM Karthik Venkataraman | Photo: R R Vasudevan

In a position arising out of Symmetrical English Opening, Levan made an unusual decision...

Karthik just played 16...e5. How would you like to continue with White here?

...on a regular day everyone will think of 17.dxe5 as their first candidate move. But Levan wasn't having it. He had momentum on his side and he took a leap of faith to gain an initiative.

Karthik managed to negate white's initiative and equalize the position. However, Levan was determined to win. What do you think he played here?

Karthik made another mistake here and missed an easy chance for Black to save the game. Find out how Black could have saved the game here.

Black has one last opportunity to save the day which Karthik missed. Find out the correct defence for Black here.

Round 8 results of 2019/01/23 at 10.00 am

Bo.	No.		Name	Rtg	Pts.	Result	Pts.		Name	Rtg	No.
1	9	GM	Stupak Kirill	2542	6	0 - 1	6½	GM	Lugovskoy Maxim	2445	20
2	5	GM	Paichadze Luka	2583	6	½ - ½	6	GM	Predke Alexandr	2620	1
3	2	GM	Pantsulaia Levan	2597	6	1 - 0	6	GM	Karthik Venkataraman	2515	12
4	3	GM	Rozum Ivan	2589	5½	½ - ½	5½	IM	Nguyen Van Huy	2450	18
5	17	IM	Akash G	2453	5½	0 - 1	5½	GM	Popov Ivan	2588	4
6	25	GM	Neelotpal Das	2419	5½	0 - 1	5½	GM	Aleksandrov Aleksej	2582	6
7	7	GM	Erigaisi Arjun	2548	5½	0 - 1	5½	IM	Girish A. Koushik	2411	28
8	10	GM	Tran Tuan Minh	2541	5½	½ - ½	5½	WGM	Babiy Olga	2275	43
9	83		Siddarth M	2040	5½	0 - 1	5½	GM	Deviatkin Andrei	2461	14
10	15	IM	Vignesh N R	2461	5½	1 - 0	5½		Saurabh Anand	2210	56
11	39	IM	Ameir Moheb	2309	5	1 - 0	5	GM	Deepan Chakkravarthy J.	2543	8
12	11	GM	Megaranto Susanto	2530	5	1 - 0	5	IM	Tran Minh Thang	2355	36
13	13	IM	Gajek Radoslaw	2481	5	½ - ½	5	IM	Saravanan V.	2318	37
14	47	IM	Deshmukh Anup	2259	5	0 - 1	5	IM	Khusenkhojaev Muhammad	2455	16
15	19	IM	Shyaamnikhil P	2446	5	½ - ½	5	IM	Konguvel Ponnuswamy	2302	41
16	21	IM	Nitin S.	2442	5	0 - 1	5		Pranesh M	2125	72
17	49		Sai Vishwesh.C	2250	5	0 - 1	5	GM	Laxman R.R.	2421	24
18	79		Bala Kannamma P	2069	5	0 - 1	5	GM	Czebe Attila	2418	26
19	29	IM	Rajesh V A V	2410	5	1 - 0	5	GM	Ziatdinov Raset	2248	50
20	31		Sahoo Utkal Ranjan	2388	5	1 - 0	5		Senthil Maran K	2183	61

Round 9 on 2019/01/24 at 10.00 AM

Bo.	No.		Name	Rtg	Pts.	Result	Pts.		Name	Rtg	No.
1	20	GM	Lugovskoy Maxim	2445	7½		7	GM	Pantsulaia Levan	2597	2
2	1	GM	Predke Alexandr	2620	6½		6½	IM	Vignesh N R	2461	15
3	4	GM	Popov Ivan	2588	6½		6½	GM	Aleksandrov Aleksej	2582	6
4	14	GM	Deviatkin Andrei	2461	6½		6½	GM	Paichadze Luka	2583	5
5	28	IM	Girish A. Koushik	2411	6½		6	GM	Rozum Ivan	2589	3
6	34	IM	Padmini Rout	2365	6		6	GM	Stupak Kirill	2542	9
7	26	GM	Czebe Attila	2418	6		6	GM	Tran Tuan Minh	2541	10
8	43	WGM	Babiy Olga	2275	6		6	GM	Megaranto Susanto	2530	11
9	12	GM	Karthik Venkataraman	2515	6		6	IM	Rajesh V A V	2410	29
10	16	IM	Khusenkhojaev Muhammad	2455	6		6		Sahoo Utkal Ranjan	2388	31
11	18	IM	Nguyen Van Huy	2450	6		6	IM	Rathnakaran K.	2373	33
12	24	GM	Laxman R.R.	2421	6		6	IM	Ameir Moheb	2309	39
13	72		Pranesh M	2125	6		5½	GM	Erigaisi Arjun	2548	7
14	46	FM	Gajwa Ankit	2263	5½		5½	IM	Gajek Radoslaw	2481	13
15	58		Samant Aditya S	2205	5½		5½	IM	Akash G	2453	17
16	56		Saurabh Anand	2210	5½		5½	IM	Shyaamnikhil P	2446	19
17	100	AGM	Vignesh N	1938	5½		5½	GM	Neelotpal Das	2419	25
18	96		Karthik Rajaa	1960	5½		5½	GM	Manik Mikulas	2413	27
19	30	IM	Muthaiah Al	2406	5½		5½	FM	Maheswaran P.	2207	57
20	35		Ritviz Parab	2362	5½		5½	IM	Hegde Ravi Gopal	2110	73

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