Tejas shock Srinath to emerge joint leader

New Delhi, Dec 17 (UNI) Tamil Nadu's Tejas Ravichandran recorded the biggest upset of the tournament as he defeated third seed and former World Under-12 champion Narayan Srinath to emerge joint leader in the the 21st National Under-13 Chess here today.

Along with Tejas, four others including Vidit Santosh Gujarathi, Prasanna Rao, Gahan M G and Vishwanath Prasad were jointly on the top of the leader board with each having maximum possible four points.

Playing the English opening with white pieces, Tejas pounced upon the opening mistakes committed by his much fancied rival and went for an all out attack.

In the ensuing long drawn out battle, Tejas earned a full point for himself by defeating his opponent after 70th move.

With the exception of Srinath, all other top seeds maintained their winning streak, with Vidit Gujarathi and Prasanna Rao of Maharashtra progressing to the fifth round with full points after defeating their respective opponents without much of a struggle.

Vidit beat his state mate Sharmili Gagare while Prasanna overcame Praveen Kumar of Andhra Pradesh.

However, the fourth round did not turn out to be a happy outing for the local players, as overnight leader Vinayak Seth tasted his first defeat of the championship in the hands of Anurag Mhmal of Goa.

The winning streak of Commonwealth gold medalist and local favorite Vaibhav Suri also came to an end after he had to sign a peace treaty with Pranav Shetty of Maharashtra after playing 30 moves.

World Under-10 bronze medalist Prince Bajaj could not shake off his dull form as he recorded his second draw of the championship.

He had to share his points with JV Sai Kiran of Andhra Pradesh.

UNI