Krishnan Sasikiran

Dresden: Grandmasters Krishnan Sasikiran and G.N. Gopal showed the way as Indian men cruised to an emphatic 3-1 victory over Sweden in the second round of the 38th Chess Olympiad here.

With their second victory in as many rounds, the Indian men remained in joint lead on four points along with 19 other teams including top seeds Russia.

In the women’s section too, the Indians came good for the second day running and defeated Latvia 3-1 to move ahead.

The Indian ladies, like their men counterparts, have four points from two outings. thanks to fine performances on the second and fourth board by Asian women’s champion Tania Sachdev and Asian junior girls’ champion Mary Ann Gomes.

Fourteen teams share the lead with a perfect score in this section and the Indian women will next clash with top seed Russia.

Spearheaded by Sasikiran on the top board the Indian men scored victories with black while the white games were drawn. Sasikiran displayed immaculate technique to down Emanuel Berg in a Ruy Lopez Brayer variation game while Gopal punished the speculative play of Grandmaster Tiger Hillarp Persson on the third board.

On the second board, Grandmaster Surya Sekhar Ganguly played out a draw with GM Evgenij Agrest while on the fourth board GM Sandipan Chanda was held to a draw by Cicak Slavko.

Among the Indian ladies D. Harika played out her second draw on the top board in as many games against Laura Rogule who played white.

(PTI)