Boris Savchenko registers second consecutive tournament victory this month

by Satanick Mukhuty - 28/08/2019

Russian Grandmaster Boris Savchenko is the winner of Tetrasoft Hyderabad Marriott GM Tournament 2019 that came to conclusion yesterday on the 27th of August. This was his second tournament victory in a row this month after Athens of the East International Open which was held in Madurai, Tamil Nadu. The Hyderabad Tetrasoft GM was dominated by foreign players as the top places were all acquired by them, but as is customary these days several Indians stole the limelight from time to time by unexpectedly toppling their higher rated opponents. Particularly noteworthy were performances by Odisha's Utkal Ranjan Sahoo, Tamil Nadu's Hari Madhavan N B, and West Bengal's Kaustuv Kundu all of whom finished just half a point behind the leaders. IM Raja Rithvik R and thirteen-year-old Pranav V also managed to grab eyeballs by beating top seeded Savchenko and Pavel Smirnov in the fifth and fourth rounds of the event.

The Tetrasoft Hyderabad Marriott Grandmaster Chess Tournament 2019 was held from the 20th to 27th of August in Marriott Hyderabad, Telangana. Organized by Mr. Srikanth Sharma, this was a ten-rounds swiss event following a time control of 90 minutes for the entire game with 30 seconds increment per move starting from move one. Both Boris Savchenko of Russia and Adam Tukhaev of Ukraine finished with 8.0/10 points each but the former was declared champion based on better tie-break score.

Boris Savchenko defeated Adam Tukhaev, who was leading hitherto, in the final round of the event to emerge as the champion | Photo: chessdom

Savchenko started slow, drawing his first round game against 1811 rated Rakshith Srinivasan, and in the fifth round he was dealt a heavy blow by IM Raja Rithvik R.

IM Raja Rithvik R. in action against Boris Savchenko in round five | Photo: telanganatoday.com

IM Raja Rithvik R. had the white pieces against top seed Boris Savchenko in round five of the event. The game opened with 1.Nf3 d6 and the position remained dynamically balanced till move 45 when a grievous error turned the tables on Black.

Raja Rithvik R - Boris Savchenko, Round 5

This was the most critical moment of the encounter. White is up two pawns but has a vulnerable king on h4 that gives Black a small window of opportunity. 45...Be4 was played in the game, can you do better?

Adam Tukhaev of Ukraine too didn't find the ideal start as he was held to draw by WFM Potluri Supreetha in the very first round!

But from round two onwards he cruised through to the top of the leaderboard only to be halted by Savchenko in the final round.

Tukhaev's final round game against Savchenko started off with an unusual line of the Zukertort opening. The Ukrainian Grandmaster had the chance to take initiative more than once during the encounter but instead he blundered which enabled the Russian to finish things off in a mere thirty-nine moves. Let's have a look at how the game ended.

Adam Tukhaev - Boris Savchenko, Round 10

White played 32.e5 and after 32...dxe5 went for a simplification with Rg5 Rxg5 Qxg5 but this sort of made his king look more vulnerable than before. Black's king was certainly much safer on d7.

The g8 knight is a devil in disguise in this position, it is ready to spring to life and assemble a deadly attack along with the black queen.

36.Qh8?? - the final blunder! White was forced to resign the game only after three moves from here, can you find how?

Six players followed just half a point behind the leaders scoring 7.5/10. The Indians among these six players were Utkal Ranjan Sahoo from Odisha, India's blitz king Laxman Rajaram, Tamil Nadu's Hari Madhavan, and West Bengal's Kaustuv Kundu. Grandmaster Laxman Rajaram's last round victory against IM Rathnakaran K., who is famously dubbed as the Indian Tal, is particularly noteworthy.

Rathnakaran K - Laxman Rajaram, Round 10

Rathnakaran truly lived up to his reputation and played the crazy 30.Kg3 in the above position. The idea is to keep the h-file open for the rooks but however the move isn't really sound. Black wasn't able to find the most punishing continuation here and went 30...Rf7, can you do better?

The best way would have been to go 30...e3! after which White really runs out of options. If 31.fxe3 then 31...Nf6 looks devastating, White's bishop on c1 is completely boxed in. 31.f3 is no remedy either as then simply 31...Rh8 32.Rh1 Bd3 renders White absolutely helpless. In the game however, after 30...Rf7 31.Be3 etc Rathnakaran was able to fight on.

Sixteen-year-old Hari Madhavan N B from Tamil Nadu created a stir with his unbeaten performance in this event as he beat two Grandmasters back-to-back in rounds seven and eight and went on to gain a whopping 58.4 Elo points!

Hari Madhavan in action against Grandmaster and the event's second seed Pavel Smirnov in round seven | Photo: telanganatoday.com

Hari beat two grandmasters in rounds seven and eight and also held two higher-rated IMs to draw in the last two rounds to score an unbeaten 7.5/10 in the event!

Let us have a look at the highlights of his eighth round encounter against GM Vasquez Schroeder Rodrigo. Hari had the White pieces in this game and opened with 1.Nf3 but the position transposed into a Slav after the second move itself.

Hari Madhavan - Vasquez Schroeder Rodrigo, Round 8

18...g5 looked a bit too committal and premature on Rodrigo's part. Can you find a logical way ahead for White?

Hari calmly maneuvered his king to c1 where it was absolutely safe. White could now think of opening up more lines on the kingside and play full-fledged on the semi-open h-file.

White, at this point, seized the winning initiative with 28.g4! All he needed now was to switch the queen over to the kingside.

This plan was realized in the next three moves. Not long after Black was compelled to resign.

Another noteworthy achievement came from thirteen-year-old Pranav V who managed to outwit Grandmaster Pavel Smirnov in a Sicilian Rossolimo. Pranav scored a commendable 7.0/10 and finished eleventh, gaining 16.4 Elo points.

Pranav kept pushing throughout the game until the Russian GM blundered on move 42 to lose an exchange. Resignation came not long after on move 59 | Photo: telanganatoday.com

Final standings of the event after ten rounds

Rk.	SNo		Name	FED	Rtg	Club/City	Pts.	TB1	TB2	TB3	TB4	TB5
1	1	GM	Savchenko Boris	RUS	2576	Russia	8,0	1,0	59,5	63,0	50,50	7
2	3	GM	Tukhaev Adam	UKR	2541	Ukraine	8,0	0,0	60,5	65,0	51,00	7
3	7	IM	Khusenkhojaev Muhammad	TJK	2442	Tajikishtan	7,5	0,0	63,0	66,5	48,00	5
4	4	IM	Triapishko Alexandr	RUS	2519	Russia	7,5	0,0	59,5	65,5	47,25	6
5	18		Sahoo Utkal Ranjan	IND	2278	Odisha - India	7,5	0,0	58,5	63,5	45,50	6
6	8	GM	Laxman R.R.	IND	2426	ICF	7,5	0,0	57,5	60,0	41,75	6
7	23		Hari Madhavan N B	IND	2231	Tamil Nadu - India	7,5	0,0	53,5	57,0	41,75	5
8	16		Kaustuv Kundu	IND	2295	West Bengal - India	7,5	0,0	52,5	56,5	41,25	6
9	5	GM	Mosadeghpour Masoud	IRI	2509	Iran	7,0	0,0	60,5	66,0	43,50	5
10	12	IM	Raja Rithvik R	IND	2364	Telangana - India	7,0	0,0	58,0	62,5	41,00	6
11	14		Pranav V	IND	2316	Tamil Nadu - India	7,0	0,0	57,0	59,5	38,00	6
12	2	GM	Smirnov Pavel	RUS	2574	Russia	7,0	0,0	56,0	59,5	39,00	6
13	19	FM	Aaryan Varshney	IND	2272	Delhi - India	7,0	0,0	55,0	60,0	40,75	5
14	20	CM	Kushagra Mohan	IND	2252	Telangana - India	7,0	0,0	53,5	57,5	37,00	6
15	10		Sammed Jaykumar Shete	IND	2416	Maharashtra - India	7,0	0,0	52,5	56,5	37,00	6
16	24	GM	Ziatdinov Raset	USA	2228	USA	7,0	0,0	51,5	55,5	37,25	5
17	55		Ayushh Ravikumar	IND	1907	Tamil Nadu - India	7,0	0,0	50,5	54,5	36,00	5
18	26		Baivab Mishra	IND	2215	Odisha - India	7,0	0,0	49,5	53,5	34,75	6
19	28	FM	Ramakrishna J.	IND	2155	Andhra Bank	7,0	0,0	46,5	50,0	34,75	6
20	13	IM	Rathnakaran K.	IND	2337	S Rly	6,5	0,0	60,5	64,5	40,00	5

Complete standings

Overview of performances by Indian players

SNo		Name	Rtg	FED	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	Pts.	Rk.
8	GM	Laxman R.R.	2426	IND	1	1	1	½	1	½	½	0	1	1	7,5	6
9	GM	Karthikeyan P.	2422	IND	1	1	1	1	0	1	0	½	1	0	6,5	21
10		Sammed Jaykumar Shete	2416	IND	½	1	1	0	0	1	1	1	1	½	7,0	15
11	IM	Muthaiah Al	2384	IND	1	½	1	½	½	1	½	½	0	1	6,5	22
12	IM	Raja Rithvik R	2364	IND	1	1	1	½	1	0	0	1	1	½	7,0	10
13	IM	Rathnakaran K.	2337	IND	1	1	0	1	1	1	½	½	½	0	6,5	20
14		Pranav V	2316	IND	1	1	1	1	½	½	0	0	1	1	7,0	11
15		Bharat Kumar Reddy Poluri	2299	IND	1	1	0	1	1	1	½	½	0	½	6,5	23
16		Kaustuv Kundu	2295	IND	1	0	1	1	1	½	½	1	1	½	7,5	8
17		Bhambure Shantanu	2288	IND	1	1	1	0	1	0	1	½	0	0	5,5	45
18		Sahoo Utkal Ranjan	2278	IND	1	1	1	½	0	1	1	½	½	1	7,5	5
19	FM	Aaryan Varshney	2272	IND	1	1	1	½	½	0	½	½	1	1	7,0	13
20	CM	Kushagra Mohan	2252	IND	1	1	1	0	1	0	1	½	1	½	7,0	14
21		Varun V	2251	IND	1	1	0	1	1	0	1	½	0	1	6,5	27
22		Nayak Rajesh	2250	IND	1	1	0	1	1	0	0	0	1	½	5,5	48
23		Hari Madhavan N B	2231	IND	½	1	½	1	½	1	1	1	½	½	7,5	7
25		Patil Pratik	2216	IND	1	1	0	1	½	1	0	1	0	1	6,5	26
26		Baivab Mishra	2215	IND	1	1	0	0	½	1	1	1	1	½	7,0	18
27	CM	Prraneeth Vuppala	2207	IND	1	0	0	1	0	0	0	0	0	0	2,0	145
28	FM	Ramakrishna J.	2155	IND	1	0	1	1	½	½	0	1	1	1	7,0	19
29		Surendran N	2152	IND	1	1	½	0	0	1	1	1	0	1	6,5	25
30		Pimpalkhare Vedant	2123	IND	1	1	0	½	½	1	½	½	1	0	6,0	33

Complete overview

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