Negi shares lead with two others in Commonwealth Chess

NEW DELHI - Second seed and leader of Indian hopes Grandmaster Parimarjan Negi, his city-mate Grandmaster Sriram Jha and Russian Grandmaster Pavel Maletin share the lead with five and half points after the sixth round matches in the Parsvnath Commonwealth Chess Championship here Thursday.

Opting to play Ruy Lopez opening with white pieces, Negi outwitted his rival Uzbek Grandmaster Saidali Iuldachev in 37 moves. Playing safe with black pieces, Jha settled for an eighteen move draw against Maletin Pavel by three-fold repetition.

Meanwhile, continuing his fine show in the championship, young Tamil Nadu International Master K. Priyadharshan held top seed Russian Grandmaster Alexey Dreev to a creditable draw.

Playing with white pieces in advanced variation of Caro-Kan defence, Priyadharshan forced his fancied rival to settle for half point in 47 moves. Earlier in the fourth and fifth rounds, Priyadharshan beat Grandmaster Pablo Lafuente of Argentina and Marat Dzhumaev of Uzbekistan.

In other sixth round encounters, Asian Chess Championship bronze medal winner Grandmaster Abhijeet Gupta signed the peace treaty with his Ukrainian rival Martyn Kravtsiv while Abhijit Kunte and B Adhiban settled for sharing points with S Nitin and Stany GA, respectively. Grandmaster Ruslan Pogorelov of Ukraine continued to find it difficult to handle the Indian youngsters as he succumbed to another defeat in the tourney at the hands of Tamilnadu teenager J. Saranya.

Negi will take on Jha while Maletin is paired against top seed Dreev in crucial seventh round matches Friday.