Backed by the two in-form stars in World Championship challenger D Gukesh and Arjun Erigaise, the Indian men scored a 3-1 victory over Azerbaijan in the fifth round of the 45th Chess Olympiad in Budapest. It seems like Gukesh and Arjun can do nothing wrong in this Olympiad as they overpowered Aydin Sulemanli and Rauf Mamedov respectively with their white pieces in quick time. Praggnanandhaa played another draw on board two to only ensure an Indian victory while Vidit Gujrathi played out a draw with Shakhriyar Mamedyarov in a marathon game to complete the triumph.

After scoring the fifth victory on the trot, the Indian men maintained a clean slate on ten points and they were joined by Vietnam who continued with their impressive show and downed Poland 2.5-1.5.

The other two teams that joined the leaders’ pack were China and Hungary who scored identical 2.5-1.5 victories over Spain and Ukraine respectively.

With six rounds still to come in the biggest chess event, Magnus Carlsen’s Norway and Iran are the only two teams sharing the fifth spot on 9 points apiece. Norway defeated a talented Turkey team by a 3-1 margin while Iran made most of the opportunities to down Canada 3.5-0.5.

In the women’s section, Grandmaster D Harika suffered a shock defeat to give Kazakhstan an early lead. Better for most of the game, Harika misplayed after many pundits believed her position to be winning against Bibisara Assaubayeva.

On the fourth board Vantika Agarwal yet again played the anchor and won a clean game with white pieces against Alua Nurman while Xeniya Balabayeva split the point with Divya Deshmukh.

With the scores tied at 2-2 it was Vaishali’s turn to come up triumphs for the team and she outwitted Meruert Kamalidenova.

Team India joined Armenia and Mongolia in the lead on ten points. Armenia halted the Chinese party for now handing them a 2.5-1.5 defeat while Mongolia proved superior to United States with a similar score.

The three leaders have 10 points apiece and they are now followed by Georgia and Poland a half point behind.

Gukesh scored his fourth victory in a row at the expense of Sulemanli. The World championship challenger got a huge middle game advantage with scattered black pieces and a weak king and made no mistakes in converting that in to a full point.

Arjun is the only Indian who has played all five games thus far and the primary reason is his ability to complicate matters with either colour. Up against Mamedov, it was Sicilian Dragon structure wherein Arjun converted to a complicated endgame and then his precise calculation helped him carve out his fifth win as many games.

For the records, Arjun is currently at 2888 ELO rating points in live ratings and just 12 short of attaining the magical 2800 mark – a summit captured by only Viswanathan Anand as an Indian.

The women section has seen some serious bouts wherein the tables were turned in quick time. In the next round now, the eves will take on Armenia.

World Championship challenger D Gukesh will look to improve his billing in the faster version as Vidit Gujrathi joins him for the Superunited rapid and blitz chess tournament, a part of the Grand Chess Tour. Set to meet Chinese Ding Liren in Singapore from November 20th to decide the next world champion, Gukesh has repeatedly proved his superior ability in the Classical format. But when it comes to faster version, the Indian is yet to find his place amongst the world elite.

The fact remains that in case of a tied result in the World Championship, there will be games under faster time control of rapid and blitz chess to determine the winner and Gukesh would like to set the record straight like American Fabiano Caruana just did a few days back in Bucharest when he won the tiebreaker by a mile winning his games against Gukesh, R Praggnanandhaa and Alireza Firouzja of France.

Gujrathi, who has got a wildcard, will be the other Indian in the fray in the USD 175000 prize money tournament that will have nine rounds under rapid and 18 under blitz chess rules.

With each win worth two points in rapid and one under the blitz rules, it remains to be seen who will be the master of Zagreb but the odds are in favour of top seed Caruana who will look forward to notching back-to-back wins on the tour.

Ian Nepomniachtchi from Russia and Alireza are another two players who can turn the tide in their favour on their day and here they have five playing days to prove their true mettle.

Wesley So of America, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave of France and Anish Giri of Holland are the other three in contention while local star Ivan Saric and another American Levon Aronian complete the ten-player line up.

So remains dangerous but is clearly struggling with form while Vachier-Lagrave has to prove himself yet again.

Levon Aronian led his team to a triumph in the last Global Chess League in Dubai but the former Armenian is clearly past his best. Giri, on the other hand, has had mixed success in faster version and will like to end it on a high.

All eyes will be on Gujrathi if he can replicate his magic. Gujrathi had come out as one of the best prepared players in the last Candidates tournament and there is every chance that he will spring a few surprises here.

Players: D Gukesh, Vidit Gujrathi (Ind); Fabiano Caruana, Levon Aronian, Wesley So (Usa); Alireza Firouzja, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave (Fra); Ian Nepomniachtchi (Fid); Ivan Saric (Cro); Anish Giri (Ned). 

File image of Praggnanandhaa© Twitter