FIDE World Cup: Divya Deshmukh fighting for survival after loss in opening game; veteran Surya Shekhar Ganguly wins

15 hours ago 7

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The engine showed that Deshmukh’s troubles started once she opted for an exchange of pawns on the 17th move. (Express Photo by Amit Kamath)

Saturday saw a mixed day for India at the FIDE World Cup in Goa with junior world champion Pranav V and the 42-year-old veteran Surya Shekhar Ganguly among the winners for the hosts in their first games of the first round. Meanwhile, Divya Deshmukh, who is the only woman to be competing at the event, tasted an opening day defeat as did the troika of international masters Aronyak Ghosh, Himal Gusain and Neelash Saha.

With the top grandmasters from India like world champion Gukesh Dommaraju, Praggnanandhaa, Arjun Erigaisi and Vidit Gujrathi entering only from the second round at the FIDE World Cup, there was plenty of attention on Deshmukh. Stamatis Kourkoulos-Arditis, Deshmukh’s opponent, admitted he was taken aback by how many cameras were trained on their board when he turned up to take his place on the board in the afternoon.

But when the game started, he held an advantage from the middle game. The engine showed that Deshmukh’s troubles started once she opted for an exchange of pawns on the 17th move. By the 23rd move, her position was hard to salvage. Eventually, she resigned on the 41st move with Kourkoulos-Arditis’ b pawn on the verge of promotion with two rooks protecting it.

“I did very well in the opening. I am not sure what went wrong with her preparation. But I was familiar with the position until a very late stage of the game,” Kourkoulos-Arditis told FIDE.

Both players will be back at the board again tomorrow with Deshmukh, who will have black pieces, playing to prevent an early elimination.

In other games involving Indians, Pranesh M and Iniyan Pa also recorded victories while Lalit Babu MR, Diptayan Ghosh, Raunak Sadhwani, Leon Luke Mendonca, SL Narayanan, and Karthik Venkataraman among the players held to draws.

Among the foreign players, 56-year-old veteran Vasyl Ivanchuk ground out a victory over Bangladesh’s while Faustino Oro, nicknamed the Messi of Chess, held experienced Croatian GM Ante Brkic to a draw.

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Indian results from Day 1 of FIDE World Cup:

GM Pranav V 1:0 Ala Eddine Boulrens (Alg); GM Raunak Sadhwani 0.5:0.5 FM Daniel Barrish (RSA); GM Pranesh M 1:0 IM Satbek Akhmedinov (Kaz); GM Leon Luke Mendonca 0.5:0.5 IM Shixu B Wang (Chn); GM Narayanan SL 0.5:0.5 IM Steven Rojas (Per); GM Iniyan Pa 1:0 GM Dylan Berdayes (Cub); GM Karthik Venkataraman 0.5:0.5 GM Roberto Garcia Pantoja (Cub); GM Surya Shekhar Ganguly 1:0 GM Ahmad Ahmadzada (AZE); GM Lalit Babu MR 0.5:0.5 Max Warmerdam (Ned); GM Diptayan Ghosh 0.5:0.5 Xiongjian Peng (Chn); IM Aronyak Ghosh 0:1 GM Mateusz Bartel (Pol); GM Divya Deshmukh 0:1 GM Stamatis Kourkoulos-Arditis (Gre); IM Himal Gusain 0:1 GM Andy Woodward (USA); IM Neelash Saha 0:1 GM Georg Meier (Uru)