Chennai Schoolboy Harshavardhan Stuns Georgian GM

Chennai, Jan 20 (PTI) Chennai schoolboy G B Harshavardhan stunned Georgia's Grand Master Mikheil Mchedlishvili in the fourth round of the 12th Chennai Open International GM chess tournament 2020 here on Monday.

With the win, Harshavardhan moved into joint lead with GMs Jose Eduardo Martinez Alcantara (Peru), Stanislav Bogdanovich (Ukraine), N R Visakh (India) and IMs Muhammad Khusenkhojaev (Tajikistan) and Indian Sayantan Das with four points.

Top-seeded GM Pavel Ponkrantov (Russia) is half a point behind the leaders at 3.5 points in a pack of 20 players.

The top board game between International Master P Karthikeyan and Ponkrantov ended in a tame draw.

On the third board, Harshavardhan brought down the experienced Mchedlishvili in 43 moves.

In other matches, Grand Masters Camilo Rios Cristhian (Columbia) and Levan Pantsulaia (Georgia) went down to Indians Srihari L R and Satkar Chirag.

Important results (Indians unless specified): Round 4: P Karthikeyan (3.5) drew with Pavel Ponkratov (Rus) 3.5, Jose Eduardo Martinez Alcantara (Peru) 4 beat S Nitin (3), Mikheil Mchedlishvili (Geo) 3 lost to Harshavardhan (4), Stanislav Bogdanovich (Ukr) 4 beat P Saravana Krishnan (3).

Sidhant Mohapatra (3) lost to N R Visakh (4), Pranav V (3.5) drew with Karthik Venkataraman (3.5), Vishnu Prasanna V (3.5) drew with Lakshmi Narayanan M V (3.5), Taher Yoseph Theolifus (Ina) 3.5 drew with Priyanka K (3.5), Jubin Jimmy (3.5) drew with Neverov Valeriy (Ukr) 3.5.

Anup Deshmukh (3) lost to Das Sayantan (4), Khusenkhojaev Muhammad (Tjk) 4 beat Ramakrishna J (3), Al Muthiah (2.5) lost to Goganov Aleksey (Rus) 3.5, Amir Moheb (Egy) 3.5 beat Ivan Rozum (Rus) 2.5, Senthil Maran K (2.5) lost to Alberto David (Ita) 3.5.

Round 3: Pavel Ponkratov beat M Pranesh 2, V Saravanan 2 lost to Martinez Alcantara 3, Saravana Krishnan 3 beat Aleksej Aleksandrov (Belarus) 2, Aleksey Goganov (Rus) 2.5 drew with L R Srihari (2.5), Samant Aditya 2 lost to Mchedlishvili 3 and Ivan Rozum 2.5 drew with Rohith Krishna S (2.5).

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