Grandmaster S S Ganguly trounced teammate T S Ravi to record his fifth victory in a row at the 41st National 'A' Chess Championship.
With nine more rounds still remaining in this marathon 23-round tournament Ganguly took his tally to 11 points out of a possible 14.
The PSPB Grandmaster beat team mate R B Ramesh in the 12th round of the National 'A' chess championship to sit pretty at the top.
The Grandmaster from PSPB has 7.5 points and is followed by five players on 6.5 in the National A chess championship.
The result saw India 'A' move to the top of the standings in the Asian team Chess championship.
A record number of 634 sportspersons were on Friday cleared by the Sports Ministry to compete at the Hangzhou Asian Games, surpassing the 572 athletes in the last edition of continental showpiece in Jakarta in 2018.
It has bolstered the home team's medal chances at the 14-day event, which is expected to see massive participation from more than 150 countries.
Indian men's chess team, led by five-time world champion Vishwanathan Anand, played a 2-2 draw against the Russian squad in the sixth round of the ongoing 43rd Chess Olympiad, in Batumi, on Sunday.
Mumba Masters secured a vital 14-5 win over Alpine Sg Pipers on day six of the Global Chess League here on Tuesday, dealing a major blow to the Pipers' chances of closing in on the top two teams.
The game incidentally was an old Sicilian where Shirov tried an unconventional ninth move.
India went down to Rest of the World 1.5-2.5 in the second round of the FIDE-Chess.com Online Nations Cup. Earlier in the opening round, India split points with USA with Humpy posting a win over Anna Zatonkish while the legendary Anand drew with the highly-rated Hikaru Nakamura.
India will be fielding three teams each in the Open and women's sections respectively.
India's top player and Asian Games gold medallist Koneru Humpy, who had come back into medal contention after a modest performance on day two, had to settle for the sixth place though she logged eight points.
Shami was there to receive the honours. He took 24 wickets in seven World Cup games last year.
India 'B' blanked Estonia 4-0 in the second round of the Open section in the 44th Chess Olympiad in Mamallapuram, Chennai, on Saturday while the second-seeded India 'A' team defeated Moldova 3.5-0.5 to make it two wins from as many matches.
Top seeded Grandmaster Koneru tried her best but could not breach Zhao Xue's defence and drew a tense game to remain joint third after the ninth round of the IS Bank Ataturk Women Grand Prix chess event in Istanbul.
The US team fought back brilliantly after being trounced in Round 1 by India to win the second and the Blitz tie-break 4.5-1.5, emerging victorious in an exciting semi-final in the FIDE Online Chess Olympiad on Tuesday.
Any player with a Chess.com blitz or FIDE standard rating of under 2000 could play with former world champion Anand by donating US$150 and with the other four GMs by paying US$25 as registration amount.
'The Indian Open team was extremely well prepared and motivated to win the gold medal.' 'With two players in the world top 10 club, and four players with over 2,700 ELO points (GMs Arjun Erigaisi, D Gukesh, R Praggnanandhaa, all below 20) and Vidit Gujrathi and P Harikrishna, it was a solid team.'
Apart from a place in the Candidates to be played in April next year in Canada, Vaishali got richer by US$25000 (Over Rs 20 Lakhs) while Vidit took home a whopping prize purse of US$80000 (Over Rs 66 Lakhs).
China won the top prize on the basis of having won the round-robin stage.
Summary of sports events and persons who made news on Sunday.
The Indian men's and women's chess teams won silver medals at the Asian Games in Hangzhou on Saturday.
In the women section being held alongside, Indian women played out a hard-fought draw against experienced Georgia 1 team. All the games were drawn.
Triveni Continental Kings beat Ganges Grandmasters, led by five-time world champion Viswanathan Anand, to set up a final against upGrad Mumba Masters.
India's schedule on Day 4 of the Asian Games on Wednesday, September 27.
Five-time world champions Viswanathan Anand and Magnus Carlsen played out a draw in the top duel of the opening day as the second edition of the Global Chess League began with players from around the world squaring off in London on Thursday.
Young Indian Grandmaster Vaishali Rameshbabu on Thursday beat International Master Munkhzul Turmunkh of Mongolia to storm into the semi-finals of the first leg of FIDE chess.com Women Speed Chess Championships but the country's top player Koneru Humpy bowed out in the opener.
India suffered a double blow, losing its third and fourth round matches to Europe and top-seeded China by similar 1.5-2.5 margins, on the second day of the FIDE-Chess.com Online Nations Cup on Wednesday. Five-time World champion Viswanathan Anand came up against a strong opponent in Ding Liren and the two agreed to sign peace in 54 moves. P Harikrishna held higher-rated Yu Yangyi to a draw while long-time rivals Koneru Humpy and Hou Yifan drew their game.
All India Chess Federation (AICF) president Sanjay Kapoor said the federation is also working on organising an Indian Chess League.
India played out a 2-2 draw against Europe in Online Nations Cup chess tournament in the eighth round, a setback after their first win in the event notched up against the Rest of the World. Vidith Gujrathi ended his barren spell with a win over Levon Aronian of Europe with white pieces while Jan-Krystozf Duda beat P Harikrishna to level the scores in the match on Friday.
Former World champion Viswanathan Anand and India cricketer Yuzvendra Chahal among others took part in an online chess charity event, raising Rs 8.8 lakh for the waste pickers' community fighting the coronavirus pandemic. "Chess For Charity", held on Saturday on chess.com, saw India No.1 Anand, No. 2 Vidit Gujrathi, Grandmaster Nihal Sarin, Woman Grandmaster Tania Sachdev and Croatia's Antonio Radic take on a team of comedians comprising Biswa Kalyan Rath, Samay Raina, Abhishek Upamanyu and Aakash Mehta.
India 'B' played out a 2-2 draw against Azerbaijan in the 9th round of the open section, while India 'A' and 'C' teams registered identical 3-1 wins in the 44th Chess Olympiad in Mamallapuram, Chennai, on Sunday.
Summary of sports events and persons who made news on Friday.
ll India Chess Federation (AICF) has offered Vidit Gujrathi and Koneru Humpy to play the remaining matches from five-star hotels.
In the women's section being held simultaneously, the Indians came back strongly to beat Poland 3-1 aided by victories from D Harika and Tania Sachdev on board two and three. Its surprising that Tania Sachdev was rested in the previous round when the Indian team drew with Serbia, losing on last two boards.
The Armenians protested for a long time delaying the start of the second round of matches before withdrawing following rejection of their appeal.
With Viswanathan Anand resting, the Indian team managed to hold their own against the favourites before Yu Yangyi subdued B Adhiban with black pieces to secure another victory in the tournament.
Summary of sports events and persons who made news on Saturday.
The stage is set for the inaugural edition of the Global Chess League to get underway in Dubai.
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