Gibraltar R03: S.L.Narayanan and Adhiban Baskaran shine

by Satanick Mukhuty - 24/01/2020

Five players led by Grandmaster Ivan Cheparinov have so far been able to maintain a perfect score of 3.0/3 in the ongoing Gibraltar Masters 2020. There are six Indians namely Vaibhav Suri, Adhiban Baskaran, Karthikeyan Murali, S.L.Narayanan, Aryan Chopra, and Lalith Babu MR, following them closely just half a point behind on 2.5/3. Adhiban and Narayanan scored emphatic wins in the third round of the event to maintain their spots in the chasing lot consisting of more than thirty players. In this illustrated report we bring you photos, game analysis, and more.

S.L.Narayanan's biggest strength is his consistency. No matter which tournament it is he is playing, he will always manage to perform solidly not giving away too many points and this is precisely the reason why the youngster has grown from strength to strength in the recent times. Things are no different in the ongoing Gibraltar Masters as well. The 21-year-old Kerala lad didn't find the ideal start in the event when he was held to a draw in the very first round by the German International Master Oswald Gschnitzer but in the last two rounds he has proved his mettle once again by scoring two important victories against Ritvars Reimanis and Lei Tingjie of Latvia and China respectively.

S.L.Narayanan is ever steady and solid as a rock! | Photo: Niklesh Jain

Narayanan's consistency can be gauged at a glance by just looking at his rating progress graph from 2019 till now. Both his classical and rapid ratings show very little fluctuations.

Let us now talk about his game against Lei Tingjie from the second round of Gibraltar Masters. This was nothing short of a strategic brilliancy where Narayanan kept improving his position slowly and solidly out of the opening itself. The Indian chose Najdorf Sicilian with the black pieces and by move 20 itself found a comfortable edge.

Lei Tingjie - S.L.Narayanan, Round 3

Lei's 12.0-0-0 inviting a double-edged fight was somewhat rare. The more popular continuation is 12.c4 where White usually castles kingside.

The queens were off the board as early as move 17 and it seems Black is doing very well here. He has an active bishop on the a7-g1 diagonal and he intends to break open the h-file for his rook soon with h4, h3 etc.

19...Kf8 was also very nice, tucking the king away to a safe spot and potentially preparing to open up the e-file as well.

A better continuation above would have been with 20.Nd2 with the idea of going Ne4. 20.Bf1 instead allowed Black to take charge can you see how?

Well, Narayanan immediately hit the nail on the head and realized his plan of opening up the h-file with 20...Bf2 21.Re2 Bg1 22.g3 hxg3 23.hxg3 Bb6 - Black now had a concrete edge.

The next idea was to open up the e-file and get both the rooks into the game.

This was achieved not long after. A pair of knights were traded off and Black easily won the fight for the e-file thereafter.

And very soon Black had his rooks dominating the 2nd rank. Narayan didn't have much difficulty converting it from here. Check out the full game below with brief analysis.

The other player who continued to impress was Adhiban Baskaran. Beating the Bulgarian player Martin Petrov with the black pieces the beast moved to 2.5/3 | Photo: Niki Riga

Martin Petrov - Adhiban Baskaran, Round 3

The players reached an equal rook-pawn ending. But Martin erred with Kd3-e2 on the 53rd move which completely turned the tables on him. Can you see what he missed?

Adhiban struck immediately here with 53...f3+ notice that White couldn't play Kf1 here because of Rd1#. Thus, the game followed 54. Ke3 Rf6 55.Ra4 Kg5 56.Ra5+ Kh6 57.Rc5 and in came 57...g3! Also note that 54.Kd1 runs into almost the same idea with 54...Rc1+ 55.Kd2 g3 and Black's pawns are suddenly running away!

Black was under tremendous pressure here and didn't have a good way to stop the pawns!

The game followed 58.Rc1 g2 59.b4 Kh5 60.a4 Rg6 61.Kg1 Kg4 62.Rc1 Re6+ 63.Kd4 Kh3 64.b5 axb5 65.axb5 Kh2 and as Black's king made his way in the Bulgarian was forced to resign. The full game is presented below.

Photo Gallery

Praggnanandhaa R defeated Padmini Rout in the third round of the event | Photo: John Saunders

Gukesh D was held to a draw by the German FM Adrian Gschnitzer | Photo: John Saunders

Leon Mendonca drew Anna Muzychuk with black pieces | Photo: John Saunders

Raunak Sadhwani held the Czech no.1 David Navara to a draw | Photo: John Saunders

Vaibhav Suri moved to 2.5/3 drawing his last game against Le Quang Liem | Photo: Niki Riga

Lalith Babu MR registered a fine victory against compatriot IM Krishna CRG | Photo: John Saunders

Results of round three

Bo.	No.		Name	Rtg	Pts.	Result	Pts.		Name	Rtg	No.
1	34	GM	Moussard Jules	2600	2	½ - ½	2	GM	Mamedyarov Shakhriyar	2770	1
2	6	GM	Le Quang Liem	2713	2	½ - ½	2	GM	Vaibhav Suri	2593	35
3	40	GM	Kadric Denis	2585	2	½ - ½	2	GM	Alekseenko Kirill	2704	7
4	8	GM	Ivanchuk Vassily	2698	2	½ - ½	2	GM	Peralta Fernando	2574	43
5	46	GM	Yuffa Daniil	2566	2	0 - 1	2	GM	Cheparinov Ivan	2686	11
6	52	GM	Ibarra Jerez Jose Carlos	2548	2	½ - ½	2	GM	Maghsoodloo Parham	2674	13
7	16	GM	Esipenko Andrey	2654	2	½ - ½	2	GM	Antipov Mikhail Al.	2562	47
8	54	GM	Kaidanov Gregory	2546	2	½ - ½	2	GM	Lagarde Maxime	2651	17
9	56	GM	Werle Jan	2545	2	½ - ½	2	GM	Donchenko Alexander	2647	19
10	22	GM	Paravyan David	2629	2	½ - ½	2	GM	Moroni Luca Jr	2532	60
11	24	GM	Durarbayli Vasif	2625	2	1 - 0	2	GM	Kotronias Vasilios	2526	63
12	26	GM	Chigaev Maksim	2616	2	1 - 0	2	GM	Hjartarson Johann	2524	64
13	66	GM	Krysa Leandro	2522	2	1 - 0	2	GM	Kobalia Mikhail	2609	27
14	28	GM	Yilmaz Mustafa	2607	2	½ - ½	2	IM	Kozak Adam	2523	65
15	105	GM	Kobo Ori	2445	2	½ - ½	2	GM	Karthikeyan Murali	2606	29
16	32	GM	Basso Pier Luigi	2600	2	1 - 0	2	IM	Abdumalik Zhansaya	2471	87
17	96	GM	Batsiashvili Nino	2456	2	0 - 1	1½	GM	Wang Hao	2758	3
18	2	GM	Vachier-Lagrave Maxime	2770	1½	1 - 0	1½	GM	Baron Tal	2529	61
19	4	GM	Topalov Veselin	2738	1½	1 - 0	1½	GM	Libiszewski Fabien	2522	67
20	68	IM	Sadhwani Raunak	2522	1½	½ - ½	1½	GM	Navara David	2717	5
21	69	IM	Flom Gabriel	2510	1½	½ - ½	1½	GM	Matlakov Maxim	2698	9
22	10	GM	Adams Michael	2694	1½	½ - ½	1½	GM	Barbosa Evandro Amorim	2501	73
23	12	GM	Jones Gawain C B	2679	1½	1 - 0	1½	IM	Raja Harshit	2482	79
24	14	GM	Saric Ivan	2655	1½	½ - ½	1½	GM	Gagare Shardul	2481	80
25	72	IM	Petrov Martin	2504	1½	0 - 1	1½	GM	Adhiban B.	2654	15
26	18	GM	Sasikiran Krishnan	2648	1½	½ - ½	1½	WGM	Pogonina Natalija	2479	81
27	74	GM	Lei Tingjie	2493	1½	0 - 1	1½	GM	Narayanan.S.L	2637	21
28	30	GM	Pichot Alan	2606	1½	1 - 0	1½	IM	Di Berardino Diego Rafael	2478	83
29	36	GM	Kryakvin Dmitry	2592	1½	½ - ½	1½	IM	Panjwani Raja	2444	107
30	84	IM	Song Raymond	2478	1½	0 - 1	1½	GM	Santos Latasa Jaime	2586	39

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