Mishra makes Sasikiran eat humble pie

By Rakesh Rao

NEW DELHI, JUNE 12. It is getting better and better for Neeraj Kumar Mishra. After surprising everyone, including himself, with his stupendous run in the National `A' championship, the 33-year- old International Master notched up the biggest victory of his career at the expense of K. Sasikiran. With it, Mishra also reinforced his chances of making the Indian team after a gap of 10 years.

Mishra, the second lowest rated player in the 19- player field, punished Sasikiran for a miscalculated knight- sacrifice.

``I have never beaten anyone with such a rating. So it is particularly pleasing,'' said a happy-go-lucky Mishra, who believes in taking life as it comes.

This stunning result not only aided Mishra, but also helped his childhood-mate Dibyendu Barua close the gap on Sasikiran. Barua, who drew with P. Harikrishna in the morning, used all his experience to down Nassir Wajih in a rook-and-bishop ending.

Top seed Sasikiran, who came back to defeat Atanu Lahiri, still leads with 12 points with two matches in hand. Barua is second with 11 points with three rounds to go. Abhijit Kunte, following draws with Lanka Ravi and Surya Shekhar Ganguly, was third with 10.5 points. Sasikiran is due to get a bye in the 18th round and Kunte, in the final round.

In the women's section, leader S. Vijayalakshmi got back to her winning ways by brushing aside Saimeera Ravi and moved to 8.5 points - a cushion of 2.5 points with just three rounds remaining.

If Vijayalakshmi wins against M.R. Sangeetha, the lowest rated player in the field, will ensure her fifth National title on Wednesday itself with two rounds to spare.

Coming back to Mishra's finest hour, it was an irregular queen- pawn opening, where Sasikiran was driven out of his preparation. In an equal position, Sasikiran sacrificed a knight for two pawns. After Mishra defended well, it became clear that it was Sasikiran, who had suffered more damage. After a series of exchanges, Sasikiran succumbed to his growing desperation and sacrificed a rook. Mishra gleefully accepted the offer and went on to win in 44 moves.

It was indeed a huge result for Mishra, who had been contemplating giving up the game for a long time. This lanky campaigner, who finished fifth in the 1987 championship when Viswanathan Anand won, last made the National team in 1991. Since then, his performance has been nothing to really talk about. But after today's sensational victory, this is what Mishra had to say, ``if I make the team this time, perhaps, I'll have a good reason to continue with chess.''

At present, Mishra is joint fifth in the company of an unbeaten Surya Shekhar Ganguly with nine points. In the remaining rounds, Mishra plays Sekhar Sahu, K. Murugan and P. Harikrishna.

As most of the men's results followed the expected course, including V. Saravanan's victory over Wajih in the battle of tailenders, the women's matches saw a couple of surprises.

Though Vijayalakshmi did what was expected of her, sister Meenakshi was allowed to escape with a draw against the inexperienced and unrated Harika Dronavalli. The draw kept Meenakshi in the second place, where she was joined by Swati Ghate and Bhagyashree Thipsay with six points.

In a rook and pawn ending, Meenakshi had to give up her rook to remove Harika's queening-pawn from the board. Thereafter, Harika looked set to complete Meenakshi's third defeat in as many days. But it was Harika's lack of ideas that saved the day for Meenakshi. Despite having 20 minutes on her clock to finish the game, against two minutes of Meenakshi, Harika spent nearly 15 minutes but only to come up with a faulty plan. She let Meenakshi queen her pawn and lost the initiative. Now it was Harika's turn to trade her rook for the all-important pawn and settle for a draw.

This poor handling of the end-game also cost Harika her maiden 10-game Woman International Master norm. Still, credit is due for this 11-year-old. Against all expectations, Harika has troubled some of the big names in the field and in turn gained tremendous respect. Considering the fact that Harika has not played enough, her showing in the championship has been very encouraging.

Satisfying win for Bhagyashree

Meanwhile, Bhagyashree scored a highly satisfying victory over fellow five-time champion Anupama Gokhale. In this Dutch defence game, Bhagyashree played aggressively and gave two pawns and a rook for a minor piece and launched a fierce attack. On the 35th move, she got back her rook and soon her free-wheeling queen threatened to run amok. Soon, Anupama resigned in a hopeless position.

Swati Ghate improved her chances of remaining in the National team with a clinical destruction of the second seed R. Aarthie in 46 moves of Sicilian Rossolimo. In the middle-game, an interesting position was reached with Swati having a queen and two active knights for Aarthie's queen and two badly-placed bishops. Aarthie did manage to exchange the minor pieces but her king remained backward. After the exchange of queens, Swati had little trouble in queening a pawn and script a fine victory.

Nisha Mohota added to the woes of Pallavi Shah. Nisha's fifth victory in the championship was Pallavi's sixth defeat.

The results:

Men: 16th round: K. Sasikiran (2611) 12 bt Atanu Lahiri (2391) 7; Neelotpal Das (2423) 4.5 drew with Neeraj Kumar Mishra (2321) 9; Sekhar Sahu (2325) 7.5 lost to D.V. Prasad (2440) 8.5; K. Murugan (2390) 6 drew with G.B. Prakash (2453) 6.5; P. Harikrishna (2504) 8.5 bt Sriram Jha (2390) 5.5; Nassir Wajih (2371) 3 lost to Dibyendu Barua (2494) 11; Lanka Ravi (2381) 7 drew with V. Saravanan (2428) 4.5; Surya Shekhar Ganguly (2456) 9 drew with Abhijit Kunte (2568) 10.5; Saptarishi Roy (2306) 6 drew with Pravin Thipsay (2453) 8.5; P. Konguvel (2383) 9.5 bye.

15th round: Thipsay drew with Ganguly; Kunte drew with Ravi; Saravanan bt Wajih; Barua drew with Harikrishna; Jha drew with Murugan; Prakash lost to Sahu; Prasad drew with Das; Mishra bt Sasikiran; Lahiri lost to Konguvel; Roy bye.

Women: 10th round: Harika Dronavalli 4.5 drew with S. Meenakshi (2248) 6; Pallavi Shah (2164) 3 lost to Nisha Mohota (2257) 5.5; Anupama Gokhale (2249) 5 lost to Bhagyashree Thipsay (2241) 6; Y. Pratibha (2069) 4 lost to Saheli Dhar Barua (2224) 4.5; Dolan Champa Bose (2187) 3.5 lost to M.R. Sangeetha (2009) 3.5; S. Vijayalakshmi (2424) 8.5 bt Saimeera Ravi (2162); Swati Ghate (2271) 6 bt R. Aarthie (2291) 5.5.

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