Areshchenko wins title, Humpy second

Ukraine's Alexander Areshchenko clinched the Mayor's Cup International chess title on Sunday after winning the tie-break with three others, including Indian Grand Masters Koneru Humpy and Magesh Chandran, after the quartet finished level on points.

Top-seeded GM Evgenij Miroshnichenko, also from Ukraine, second seed Areshchenko, fourth seed Humpy and Magesh were tied at the end of the eleventh and final round with nine points each and the deadlock was broken by the Buchholz rule.

Areshchenko finished on top to clinch the crown, Humpy was runner-up while Miroshnichenko and Magesh ended up third and fourth, but all of them received Rs 1.65 lakh as their share of the combined prize money for the first four places.

In the concluding round, overnight leader Areshchenko drew with Uzbek GM Iuldachev Saidali while the other three players, all trailing the front-runner by half a point going into the last day, won their ties.

Humpy, with white pieces, defeated Ukrainian GM Yaroslav Zinchenko in 41 moves and Miroshnichenko downed Kazakstan GM Petr Kostenko in 47 moves.

Magesh (ELO 2462) caused a major upset by defeating the higher ranked Russian GM Vladimir Belov (ELO 2623) in 43 moves to force a four-way tie on points in the Rs 12 lakh prize money event held at the suburban Goregaon Sports Club.

Six other players finished with the same number of points (8.5) after the lead bunch.

The tie break rule was applied to give Russian GM Andrei Deviatkin, the fifth spot, followed by Deepan Chakkravarthy of India, Geogy Timoshenko (Ukraine), M Shyam Sunder (India), Saidali and Shukhrat Safin (both Uzbekistan), in that order.

In the last final round, 23-year-old Areshchenko who had become a GM aged only 15, settled for a quick draw after only ten moves with GM Saidali (ELO 2497) in the Sicilian Defense Najdorf Variation game.

On the third board, world no. 2 woman player Humpy (ELO 2612), playing with white pieces against Zinchenko, gained one centre pawn in the middle game and created her d-file pawn passer.

She gained her rival's rook on the 32nd move for her own rook, pushed her d-file pawn to the seventh rank and brought her rook on the eighth rank near the pawn to force Zinchenko under pressure and capitulation.

On board no.2, Miroshnichenko (ELO 2680) defeated Kostenko (ELO 2490). In the English opening, Kostenko sacrificed his knight for two pawns very early in the game.

Miroshnichenko, who was a piece up, played carefully thereafter and won the game in 47 moves.

The final standings (top 25; all from India unless stated otherwise):

9 points  - 1. Alexander Areschchenko (Ukr), 2. Koneru Humpy, 3. Evgenij Miroshnichenko (Ukr), 4. P Magesh Chandran

8.5 points - 5. Andrei Deviatkin (Rus), 6. Deepan Chakkravarthy, 7. Georgy Timoshenko (Ukr), 8. M Shyam Sundar, 9. Saidali Iuldachev (Uzbek), 10. Shukhrat Safin (Uzbek)

8 points - 11. Yaroslav Zinchenko (Ukr), 12. Abhijeet Gupta, 13. Himanshu Sharma, 14. Zia-Ur-Rahman (Ban), 15. Petr Kostenko (Kaz), 16. B S Shivananda, 17. S Satyapragyan, 18. Seribay Temirbayev (Kaz), 19. Dinesh Sharma, 20. Arghyadip Das, 21. Neelotpal Das, 22. G B Prakash, 23. Murshed Niaz (Ban), 24. Nikhil Shyam, 25. G A Stany