PADMINI WINS TO MAINTAIN JOINT LEAD IN GIRLS SECTION VIDIT LOSES, S L NARAYANAN IN JOIN LEAD

Padmini Rout scored an impressive victory with plenty of fireworks in the sixth round of the LIC World Junior Girls Chess championship being played at Hotel Hyatt. Entertaining and enthralling the following spectators, Padmini sacrificed her queen to unveil a spectacular checkmate against Ioana Gelip of Romania. However the joy in the Indian camp was short lived as within minutes of this result, Viddit Santosh Gujrathi, India's best bet for the title blundered and was shocked by Aryan Tari of Norway in the Open section.

S L Narayanan continued to impress, today drawing against top seed Vladimir Fedoseev of Russia after a marathon fight lasting 76 moves. N Srinath too continued the good work and held higher rated Duda Jan Krzysztof of Poland while Sahej Grover also showed plenty of defensive skills to hold third seed Wei Yi of China. Sayantan Das also logged a good result by holding second seed Robin Van Kampen to a draw after 75 moves. This 13 round Swiss league event is co-sponsored by Amanora, ONGC, Jain Irrigation and Everstone.

Padmini and Daria Pustovoita of Russia were in joint lead with 5 points each while Nandhidhaa defended dourly in an inferior position to draw against higher rated Mo Zhai.

In the Open section four players Lu Shanglei, Jorge Cory, S L Narayanan and Mikhail Antipov have emerged joint leaders with 5 points each. The encounter between Lu Shanglei and Jorge Cori on the top board was the last one to finish after 94 moves and ended in deadlock.

​L​oana opted for the French Defence and despite castling early was hampered by development problems. Padmini did not take time off to castle but instead focussed on launching a major attack on the King-side even as her opponent tried to work her way around the queen-side.

Strangely Ioana tried to gobble up all the pawns that Padmini gave up in her quest for attack and her knight, bishop and rook on the queen-side could never get into the game. On the 27th move Padmini offered to sacrifice her queen which her opponent declined as it would lead to a checkmate. Padmini has spent plenty of time in the mid-game stages and virtually was living on borrowed time ( 30 seconds increment per move) and had to make around 10 moves in less than a minute. The Romanian however lost way and accepted Padmini's queen after a while only to be checkmated by a couple of rooks and bishop on the 38th turn. ' I had calculated the queen sacrifice well in advance and did not bother much about the lack of time later" said Padmini.

Vidit appeared to be going fine against Aryan Tari of Norway and though the position appeared balanced, the Indian contingent felt that Viddit appeared better. One wrong check by the Indian and his game collapsed like a pack of cards and Aryan threatened checkmate with his rook and queen after 45 moves.