Parimarjan remains in joint lead in Parsvnath Open

New Delhi, Jan 13 (PTI) Grandmaster Parimarjan Negiremained in joint lead after settling for a draw with LenicLuka of Slovenia in the eighth round of 9th ParsvnathInternational Open chess tournament here at Ludlo CastleSports complex.

Negi and Luka were joined in the lead by compatriotGrandmaster S Kidambi along with Ukrainian trio of AlexanderAreshchenko, Yuriy Kuzubov and Mikhailo Oleksienko, who alltook their tally to seven points out of a possible eight.

As many as eight players including former world juniorchampion Abhijeet Gupta and highly regarded ChineseGrandmaster Ni Hua share the second spot jointly, a half pointadrift of the leaders.

S Kidambi stole the honours on the day, following afinely crafted victory over Icelandic Grandmaster HannesStefansson.

Playing black, Kidambi held his position together for along time and his peace proposal too was turned down byStefansson in the endgame. However, as the game progressed,Stefansson pushed harder than necessary and was duly punishedfor his over-ambitious approach.

At the top of the tables, Parimarjan used a lot of timeon his clock in the early phase of an Exchange Ruy Lopez. Lukacame up with an early opening surprise and did not have manytroubles in maintaining the balance after a simplified endgamewas reached in quick time. The draw was a just result.

Top seed Areshchenko proved his mettle in a difficultgame against compatriot Yaroslav Zherebukh who played white.

The game was played till the very end and with both playersfalling under serious time pressure it was more a matters ofnerves. Areshchenko won with a fine finish in the end.

Amongst the 6.5 pointers, International Master V Kamblecontinued his dream run and defeated Avigdor Bykhovsky ofIsrael. After outwitting GM Neelotpal Das in the previousround this was another great result for the Mumbai-basedplayer.

Grandmaster Abhijeet Gupta was troubled a lot initiallyby IM Saptarshi Roy but he eventually managed to turn thetables after an erroneous plan by the latter.

After a rather lackluster show in the previous round,this was a good turnaround for Abhijeet.

Amongst local players, young gun Vaibhav Suri continuedto impress and held GM Konstantin Chernyshov of Russia to adraw, while National sub-junior champion Sahaj Groveroutplayed Arjun Tiwari to move to 6.5 points. .