Asian championship wide open

By S. Sabanayakan

KOLKATA, AUG. 8.One of the toughest tournament to be held in India outside the world meet, the third Asian individual chess championship, beginning here at the Gorky Sadan from Thursday, looks wide open with a number of top-rated Grandmasters and a array of International Masters bunched closely.

On the eve of the meet, the highest ranked GM from China Zhong Zhang, with an Elo rating of 2667, has withdrawn following his qualification from another zone. This means his compatriot Jun Xu at 2646, will be the seed No. 1. The host will largely depend on two GMs, Abhijit Kunte and Dibyendu Barua, to hold aloft the tricolour. India's second best GM after V. Anand, K. Sasikiran, has qualified from the Colombo leg.

Most of the participants, including the Indian GMs, are of the opinion that it will be difficult to say any one player as the favourite, for the top players are closely knit on the Elo rating as well as on form. ``The field is so tough that it would be difficult to predict the outcome,'' feels Barua who did so wonderfully well at Colombo but botched up his chances with two losses in the last two rounds.

``The field at the Colombo meet was not as strong as this. It will be really difficult to come out winner here, for everyone in this field will be gunning for the 10 spots available from this championship,'' he says. GM Kunte too feels the same.

Xiaomin Peng of China at 2629 is followed by Evgeny Vladimirov of Kazakhstan. Vladimirov till recently the Indian coach and made way for Maxim Sorokin of Argentina, will be ranked third with an Elo of 2612. Utut Adianto of Indonesia, an old face, too is a hard customer to tackle. China has named Li Wenliang (2495) as the replacement of the top seed but failed to indicate whether he is a GM or an IM.

For the first time the digital clocks will be used outside the World championship held at New Delhi last year. And this is expected to give the cutting edge to the players. The Indian contingent is the biggest with 12 participants. There are 10 each from China and the Philippines and seven from Kazakhstan. The world's 26th rated Zhang's pull out has reduced the number of players having above 2600 points from five to four. Among the IMs there are several double GM norm holders including India's D. Prasad, Sandipan Chanda and Ehsan Ghaem Maghami of Iran. The only notable double GM norm holder missing in the field is G.B. Prakash of India. The field also includes two former world junior champions. WGM Hoang Thanh Trang of Vietnam and Kazakh Darmen Sadvakasov. Both emerged the world champions at Kozhikode in 1998 with the former winning the women's title and the latter the men's. Sadvakasov, with a rating of 2568, was second from Asia to win the junior world crown after Anand. Tarang is the only woman in the field. She also holds a men's IM title.

The following are the list of GMs with Elo ratings in brackets: Jun Xu (Chi, 2646), Xiaomin Peng (Chi, 2629), Evgeny Vladimirov (Kazakh, 2612), Pavel Kostur (Kazakh, 2600), Utut Adianto (Indo, 2598), K. Sasikiran (India, 2598), Murtas Kagaleyev (Kazakh, 2568), Thien Hai Dao (Vie, 2572), Darmen Sadvakasov (Kazakh), Wenjin Wu (Chi, 2560), Zili Wang (Chi, 2557), Abhijit Kunte (Ind, 2547), Eugenio Torre (Phi, 2541), Rogelio Antonio Jr. (Phi, 2535), Anh Dung Nguyen (Vie, 2533), Shukhrat Safin (Uzb, 2529), Jinrong Liang (Chi, 2510), Mihail Saltaev (Uzb, 2510), Saidali Iuldachev (Uzb, 2508), D. barua (Ind, 2499), Marat Dzhumaev (Uzb, 2497), Alexei Barsov (Uzb, 2495), Md. Al-Modiahki (Qatar, 2492), Sergei Zagrebelny (Uzb, 2466), Niaz Murshed (Ban, 2453), Praveen M. Thipsay (Ind, 2453), Serik Temirbaev (Kazakh, 2425), Salauat Izmukhambetov (Kazakh).

International Masters: Liang Chong (Chi, 2556), P. Harikrishna (Ind, 2522), Shaoteng Yu (Chi, 2517), Ehsan Ghaem Maghami (Iran, 2509), Petr Kostenko (Kaz, 2494), Pengziang Zhang (Chi, 2487), Orazly Annageldyev (Tur, 2485), Tahir Vakhidov (Uzb, 2474), Alibek Ibragimov (Kaz, 2469), Ziaur Rahman (Ban, 2468), Surya Sekhar Ganguly (Ind, 2464), Vladimir Egin (Uzb, 2451), Hoang Thanh Trang (Vie, 2445), D. V. Prasad (Ind, 2440), Imad Hakki (Syria, 2428), Anvar Nazarov (Taji, 2410), Chito Garma (Phi, 2409), Dede Liu (Indo, 2402), Abdulla Al-Rakib (Ban, 2393), Lanka Ravi (Ind, 2389), P. Konguvel (Ind, 2371), Fadi Eid (Leb, 2370), Hohsen Ghorbani (Iran, 2334), N.K. Mishra (Ind, 2293), Md. N. Al- Syed (Qatar, 2299).

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