Samarkand (Uzbekistan), Sep 12 (PTI) Grandmaster Nihal Sarin halted Parham Maghsoodloo's unbeaten run with a brilliant victory to join the leaders after the seventh round of the FIDE Grand Swiss here, while R Vaishali also regained sole lead in the women's section.
However, world champion D Gukesh's struggles continued as he slumped to a third straight defeat here on Thursday, this time against Turkey's Ediz Gurel, slipping out of contention and down to 10th in the live world rankings with four rounds still to play.
Vaishali, a winner in the previous edition held in Isle of Man in United Kingdom, outclassed her Chinese counterpart in the seventh round and now sits half a point behind Russian Kateryna Lagno.
The day however belonged to Sarin who came up with some exemplary display on both flanks.
The Queen pawn opening as white worked well for Nihal as he was able to push for an advantage with little at stake and Maghsoodloo erred in calculation when it really mattered.
Nihal set up a brilliant finish with the help of his queen and knight and handed Maghsoodloo his first loss in the tournament.
With the victory Nihal shot into joint lead along with Germany's Bluebaum who defeated higher ranked Indian Arjun Erigaisi.
Vaishali also displayed her superior skills to get the better of Guo Qi.
The Petroff defense was met suitably and Vaishali, white, got a chance to go for a king side attack.
The Indian is known for her attacking skills and did not disappoint in finding out the precise move order.
In the open section, defending champion Vidit Gujrathi came back in reckoning with a victory over French GM Marcandria Maurizzi while R Praggnanandhaa also made a fine recovery to beat Maxim Rodshtein of Israel.
Important and Indian results round 7 open (Indians unless specified): Nihal Sarin (5.5) beat Parham Maghsoodloo (Iri, 5); Arjun Erigaisi (4.5) lost to Matthias Bluebaum (Ger, 5.5); Anish Giri (Ned, 5) drew with Abhimanyu Mishra (Usa, 5); Alireza Firouzja (Fra, 5) beat Nodirbek Yakubboev (Uzb, 4); Nikolas Theodorou (Gre, 4.5) drew with Vincent Keymer (Ger, 4.5): Nodirbek Abdusattorov (Uzb, 5) beat Amin Tabatabaei (Iri, 4)’ Hans Moke Niemann (Usa, 5) beat Yagiz Kaan Erdpgmus (Tur, 4) Vidit Gujrathi (5) beat Marcandria Maurizzi (Fra, 4); V Pranav (4.5) drew with Jordan Van Foreest (Ned, 4.5); R Praggnanandhaa (4.5) beat Maxim Rodshtein (Isr, 3.5); Levon Aronian (4) drew with Abhimanyu Puranik (4); Ediz Gurel (4) beat D Gukesh (3); Sanan Sjugirov (Hun, 3.5) drew with P Harikrishna (3.5); Raunak Sadhwani (3.5) drew with Alexandr Predke (Srb, 3.5); Boris Gelfand (Isr, 3.5) drew with S L Narayanan (3.5); Jeffery Xiong (Usa, 3.5) drew with Aditya Mittal (3.5); Aryan Chopra (3) drew with Amin, Bassem (Egy, 3); Divya Deshmukh (3.5) beat Velimir Ivic (Srb, 3.5); Jon Ludvig Hammer (Nor, 1.5) lost to Murali Karthikeyan (2.5) Women: Antoaneta Stefanova (Bul, 5) drew with Kateryna Lagno (Fid, 5.5); R Vaishali (6) beat Guo Qi (Chn, 4.5); Bibisara Assaubayeva (Kaz, 5) beat Irina Bulmaga (Rou, 4); Mariya Muzychuk (Ukr, 5) beat Afruza Khamdamova (Uzb, 4); Tsolakidou, Stavroula (Gre, 4.5) drew with Olga Girya (Fid, 4.5); Song Yuxin (Chn, 5) beat Ulviyya Fataliyeva (Aze, 4); Dinara Wagner (Ger, 4) lost to Tan Zhongyi (Chn, 4.5); Alexandra Kosteniuk (Rus, 4) drew with Dronavalli Harika (4); Umida Omonova (Uzb, 2.5) lost to Vantika Agrawal (3.5).
This report includes content sourced from Press Trust of India (PTI), edited for clarity and context.
