Chennai 2018 Round 8: Deepan and Laxman play a crazy game of chess!

by Sagar Shah - 24/01/2018

There are days in chess when the quality of the game takes precedence over the result. Eighth round at the Chennai International 2018 was one such day! Deepan Chakkravarthy playing with the white pieces complicated the position to such an extent that there was no coming back. Laxman held his nerve, took advantage of Deepan's inaccuracies and scored a win. He now leads the tournament with 7.0/8 along with Ivan Rozum. Ivan beat his Ukrainian opponent Adam Tukhaev. Round nine will see this interesting clash on the top board between Rozum and Laxman. In the round eight report we have a detailed analysis of the Deepan vs Laxman encounter.

Chess can be played with different energy levels by different players. There are some strong players who are content with a draw and for them chess is more of a result-oriented exercise than anything else. But there are a few players who want to play uncompromising chess, come what may! It doesn't matter whether they are in the lead or they are struggling on the last board, they just want to fight it out. One such player is Deepan Chakkravarthy. Deepan was in the joint lead with three other players and was fighting it out on the top board against GM Laxman Rajaram.

Deepan gets up from the board to have a neutral view of the position!

Black's pieces looked menacingly placed towards White's king. So Deepan pushed his pawn to f4. Now the position becomes extremely sharp because the knight moves from e4 and the e3 pawn is extremely weak.

Black has won the e3 pawn, but White has a trick up his sleeve - Rxc5! If Bxc5 then Qc2 with a double attack on c5 and h7.

The most critical moment of the game. White sacrifices his queen with ...Ne3+ Rxg3 Nxd1, but he had seen a bit further

Rxg7! was a powerful strike with Deepan getting a very dangerous attack!

Rxh7 would have given White a tangible advantage, instead Deepan played Rdg5 and after Qc7 the attack didn't crash through!

When you play such complex games, it is not possible to have control over the position and the calculations!

"Chess is cruel" - Deepan Chakkravarthy!

Good luck buddy! Now go and win the tournament!

Two good friends Adam Tukhaev (white) and Ivan Rozum (black) faced each other in the eighth round

After the game, we asked Adam - what went wrong? "Ivan just played too strong!" Rozum has found his groove and is now two steps away from winning a title on Indian soil. Laxman stands in his way! Who will win the crucial ninth round?

Sergei Tiviakov is having a hard time at the event. He lost the eighth round against...

...GM Marat Dzhumaev. The Uzbek GM really played a power packed game to outwit his strong Dutch opponent.

Watching his protege closely - IM V. Saravanan visits the playing hall

Two men who are critical for the success of the event: Chief arbiter Nitin Shenvi (left) and technical director R. Anantharam

IM Ravi Hegde beat FM Ankit Gajwa

Not his best tournament in the circuit. Suat Atalik is on 6.0/8.

Kushagra Mohan is playing solid chess and is already gaining 55 Elo points from this event!

Not the happiest of performances for Timur. But if he wins the last two rounds he can finish with a very respectable 8.0/10.

Visakh N.R. is currently on 6.5/8

How can you go wrong when Vishy is your guru!

The joy of being in Chennai - Filter coffee!

Results of round 8

Bo.	No.		Name	Rtg	Pts.	Result	Pts.		Name	Rtg	No.
1	5	GM	Tukhaev Adam	2570	6	0 - 1	6	GM	Rozum Ivan	2595	2
2	14	GM	Deepan Chakkravarthy J.	2475	6	0 - 1	6	GM	Laxman R.R.	2434	19
3	18	GM	Dzhumaev Marat	2434	5½	1 - 0	5½	GM	Tiviakov Sergei	2584	3
4	20	IM	Nitin S.	2422	5½	½ - ½	5½	GM	Sivuk Vitaly	2550	6
5	21	IM	Llaneza Vega Marcos	2421	5½	½ - ½	5½	GM	Atalik Suat	2538	8
6	9	GM	Pruijssers Roeland	2536	5½	½ - ½	5½		Muthaiah Al	2291	34
7	25	FM	Erigaisi Arjun	2386	5½	1 - 0	5½	IM	Karthikeyan P.	2497	10
8	13	FM	Karthik Venkataraman	2476	5½	½ - ½	5½	IM	Sidhant Mohapatra	2382	26
9	17	IM	Visakh N R	2457	5½	1 - 0	5½		Saravana Krishnan P.	2323	30
10	7	GM	Tran Tuan Minh	2548	5	1 - 0	5½		Pranav V	2275	38
11	1	GM	Gareyev Timur	2605	5	1 - 0	5		Singh S. Vikramjit	2227	42
12	4	GM	Solodovnichenko Yuri	2571	5	1 - 0	5		Mithil Ajgaonkar	2219	48
13	52		Tiwari Arjun	2179	5	0 - 1	5	GM	Horvath Adam	2484	12
14	15	IM	Khusenkhojaev Muhammad	2462	5	½ - ½	5		Harshavardhan G B	2107	68
15	56		Sahil Tickoo	2161	5	0 - 1	5	GM	Czebe Attila	2458	16
16	59	CM	Kushagra Mohan	2150	5	½ - ½	5		Arjun Kalyan	2407	22
17	23	IM	Raghunandan Kaumandur Srihari	2402	5	1 - 0	5		Kumar S.	1852	134
18	64		Dixit Nikhil	2139	5	½ - ½	5	IM	Rathnakaran K.	2372	27
19	136	WFM	Lakshmi C	1836	5	0 - 1	5	GM	Roy Chowdhury Saptarshi	2318	31
20	69	IM	Hegde Ravi Gopal	2105	5	1 - 0	5	FM	Gajwa Ankit	2284	36

Rank after round 8

Rk.	SNo		Name	sex	FED	Rtg	Club/City	Pts.	TB1	TB2	TB3	TB4	TB5
1	19	GM	Laxman R.R.		IND	2434	ICF	7,0	0,0	38,0	41,5	35,50	6,0
2	2	GM	Rozum Ivan		RUS	2595	RUS	7,0	0,0	35,0	37,5	33,50	6,0
3	17	IM	Visakh N R		IND	2457	TN	6,5	0,0	37,5	41,0	32,75	5,0
4	18	GM	Dzhumaev Marat		UZB	2434	UZB	6,5	0,0	36,0	40,0	32,00	6,0
5	25	FM	Erigaisi Arjun		IND	2386	TEL	6,5	0,0	35,0	39,0	31,75	5,0
6	5	GM	Tukhaev Adam		UKR	2570	UKR	6,0	0,0	41,0	45,0	31,50	5,0
7	13	FM	Karthik Venkataraman		IND	2476	AP	6,0	0,0	40,0	44,0	31,00	5,0
8	69	IM	Hegde Ravi Gopal		IND	2105	KAR	6,0	0,0	40,0	43,5	30,75	5,0
9	14	GM	Deepan Chakkravarthy J.		IND	2475	ICF	6,0	0,0	40,0	43,0	30,00	5,0
10	9	GM	Pruijssers Roeland		NED	2536	NED	6,0	0,0	38,5	42,5	30,75	4,0
11	6	GM	Sivuk Vitaly		UKR	2550	UKR	6,0	0,0	38,5	42,0	29,25	5,0
12	26	IM	Sidhant Mohapatra		IND	2382	ODI	6,0	0,0	36,5	40,0	28,50	5,0
13	7	GM	Tran Tuan Minh		VIE	2548	VIE	6,0	0,0	36,5	40,0	28,00	6,0
14	1	GM	Gareyev Timur		USA	2605	USA	6,0	0,0	36,0	40,5	28,50	6,0
15	21	IM	Llaneza Vega Marcos		ESP	2421	ESP	6,0	0,0	36,0	39,0	27,50	5,0
16	12	GM	Horvath Adam		HUN	2484	HUN	6,0	0,0	35,5	40,0	29,50	6,0
17	34		Muthaiah Al		IND	2291	TN	6,0	0,0	35,5	38,5	26,25	5,0
18	20	IM	Nitin S.		IND	2422	TN	6,0	0,0	35,0	37,5	27,50	4,0
19	23	IM	Raghunandan Kaumandur Srihari		IND	2402	KAR	6,0	0,0	34,0	37,5	27,25	5,0
20	16	GM	Czebe Attila		HUN	2458	HUN	6,0	0,0	33,5	37,5	28,25	4,0

Pairing of round 9:

1	2	GM	Rozum Ivan	2595	7	7	GM	Laxman R.R.	2434	19
2	17	IM	Visakh N R	2457	6½	6½	GM	Dzhumaev Marat	2434	18
3	25	FM	Erigaisi Arjun	2386	6½	6	GM	Solodovnichenko Yuri	2571	4
4	16	GM	Czebe Attila	2458	6	6	GM	Gareyev Timur	2605	1
5	5	GM	Tukhaev Adam	2570	6	6	IM	Nitin S.	2422	20
6	6	GM	Sivuk Vitaly	2550	6	6	GM	Deepan Chakkravarthy J.	2475	14
7	26	IM	Sidhant Mohapatra	2382	6	6	GM	Tran Tuan Minh	2548	7
8	8	GM	Atalik Suat	2538	6	6	IM	Raghunandan Kaumandur Srihari	2402	23
9	31	GM	Roy Chowdhury Saptarshi	2318	6	6	GM	Pruijssers Roeland	2536	9
10	12	GM	Horvath Adam	2484	6	6	IM	Llaneza Vega Marcos	2421	21
11	34		Muthaiah Al	2291	6	6	FM	Karthik Venkataraman	2476	13
12	3	GM	Tiviakov Sergei	2584	5½	6	IM	Hegde Ravi Gopal	2105	69
13	38		Pranav V	2275	5½	5½	IM	Karthikeyan P.	2497	10
14	68		Harshavardhan G B	2107	5½	5½	GM	Nguyen Duc Hoa	2490	11
15	93	CM	Bharath Subramaniyam H	1998	5½	5½	IM	Khusenkhojaev Muhammad	2462	15
16	22		Arjun Kalyan	2407	5½	5½		Ram S. Krishnan	2223	44
17	24	IM	Ameir Moheb	2394	5½	5½	CM	Kushagra Mohan	2150	59
18	27	IM	Rathnakaran K.	2372	5½	5½		Nguyen Phuoc Tam	2068	79
19	30		Saravana Krishnan P.	2323	5½	5½		Dixit Nikhil	2139	64
20	33	IM	Kandil Adham	2294	5½	5½		Barath Kalyan M	2022	88

Chennai 2018 Round 8: Deepan and Laxman play a crazy game of chess!

Results of round 8

Rank after round 8

Pairing of round 9:

Watch the games live