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Nat. Teams 08+09: Was there ever a doubt?

by Priyadarshan Banjan - 13/02/2017

No, there wasn't. The tournament was decided on the fourth day itself when Railways-A bulldozed through Air India and Airport Authority of India mercilessly. In the end, Railways-A won with a perfect score of 18 match points. But there were some surprises in the last round! Also, Air India took the women's' team title. Illustrated report.

Nat. Teams 08+09: Was there ever a doubt?

There were no surprises towards the end of the National Teams Championship 2017. Railways-A romped home with a perfect score of 18 match points from nine rounds, each round's win counting for 2 points.

Railways-A smashed Karnataka 4-0 in the eighth round and...

...beat Madhya Pradesh 2.5-1.5. Where did the railways drop a point and a half? On the top board GM-elect P. Karthikeyan had to take a perpetual against young Anuj Shrivatri (1942)!
[Event "37th National Team Chess Championship 2"]
[Site "Bhopal"]
[Date "2017.02.08"]
[Round "9.1"]
[White "Anuj, Shrivatri"]
[Black "Karthikeyan, P."]
[Result "1/2-1/2"]
[ECO "A43"]
[WhiteElo "1942"]
[BlackElo "2506"]
[PlyCount "78"]
[EventDate "2017.02.02"]
[EventType "team"]
[EventRounds "9"]
[EventCountry "IND"]
[SourceDate "2003.06.08"]
[WhiteTeam "MP TEAM - B"]
[BlackTeam "Indian Railway A"]
1. d4 Nf6 2. Nf3 c5 3. d5 d6 4. Nc3 g6 5. e4 Bg7 6. Be2 O-O 7. O-O Na6 8. Nd2
Nc7 9. a4 Rb8 10. Nc4 b6 11. f3 Ba6 12. Bg5 e6 13. dxe6 Nxe6 14. Bh4 Nf4 15.
Re1 d5 16. Nxd5 N4xd5 17. exd5 Qxd5 18. Qxd5 Nxd5 19. c3 Nxc3 20. bxc3 Bxc3 21.
Bd3 Bxa1 22. Rxa1 Rfe8 23. Rd1 Re6 24. Bf1 Kg7 25. Bg3 Ra8 26. Rd7 Kf8 27. Rc7
Kg8 28. Nd6 Bxf1 29. Kxf1 f6 30. Nf7 Kf8 31. Nh6 Rd8 32. Rf7+ Ke8 33. Rxa7 Rd1+
34. Kf2 Rd2+ 35. Kf1 c4 36. Rc7 Rd1+ 37. Kf2 Rd2+ 38. Kf1 Rd1+ 39. Kf2 Rd2+
1/2-1/2

 

Unheralded MP boy Ashwin Daniel (1999) played a nice game with the black pieces against the London System to beat GM Deepan Chakkravarthy on the second board!
[Event "37th National Team Chess Championship 2"]
[Site "Bhopal"]
[Date "2017.02.08"]
[Round "9.2"]
[White "Deepan, Chakkravarthy J"]
[Black "Aishwin, Daniel"]
[Result "0-1"]
[ECO "D93"]
[WhiteElo "2480"]
[BlackElo "1999"]
[PlyCount "74"]
[EventDate "2017.02.02"]
[EventType "team"]
[EventRounds "9"]
[EventCountry "IND"]
[SourceDate "2003.06.08"]
[WhiteTeam "Indian Railway A"]
[BlackTeam "MP TEAM - B"]
1. d4 d5 2. Bf4 Nf6 3. e3 g6 4. Nf3 Bg7 5. c4 c6 6. Nc3 O-O 7. h3 Nbd7 8. Bd3
dxc4 9. Bxc4 b5 10. Be2 b4 11. Na4 Qa5 12. O-O Nd5 13. Bh2 N5b6 14. Nxb6 axb6
15. Nd2 Ba6 16. Nc4 Bxc4 17. Bxc4 b5 18. Be2 c5 19. Bf3 Rad8 20. Qc1 c4 21. b3
e5 22. bxc4 exd4 23. c5 Ne5 24. Bb7 d3 25. c6 d2 26. Qc2 Nc4 27. c7 Bxa1 28.
cxd8=Q Rxd8 29. e4 Qa4 30. Qxa4 bxa4 31. Bd5 Bc3 32. Bc7 Rd7 33. Bxc4 d1=Q 34.
Rxd1 Rxd1+ 35. Kh2 Rb1 36. e5 b3 37. axb3 axb3 0-1

 

Railways-A with their winnings

Finishing second behind them was the top-seeded Airport Authority of India.

The Services was a unique team in the tournament. (From left) Neeraj Kumar, Arun Kumar, Prasenjit Pramanik, Gopakumar MS (Coach), Asem Indrajit Singh and Rapalli Krishna. Except Asem, the remaining men work in the Indian Air Force. Gopakumar, who also works in the Air Force, was the coach of the team. Asem works in the Indian Navy and is also the highest rated player in the team with Elo 1753. Surprisingly, 20th seeds Services finished eighth in the tournament ahead of several stronger teams with titled players! (Wow, seriously!)

Final Ranking after 9 Rounds

Rk. SNo Team Games   +    =    -   TB1   TB2   TB3   TB4 
1 2 Indian Railway A 9 9 0 0 18 0 32,0 175,5
2 1 Airport Authority of India 9 7 0 2 14 0 26,5 182,5
3 5 Viyugam CA 9 6 1 2 13 3 22,5 183,0
4 4 Indian Railway B 9 5 3 1 13 2 24,5 168,0
5 3 Air India 9 6 1 2 13 1 21,5 189,5
6 6 LIC 9 6 0 3 12 0 23,5 174,5
7 7 Tamil Nadu - A 9 5 1 3 11 0 22,5 178,0
8 20 SSCB 9 5 1 3 11 0 21,0 156,5
9 9 Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited 9 4 3 2 11 0 20,5 175,0
10 12 Andhra Bank 9 3 5 1 11 0 20,0 157,5

 

In the women's section, the event was only seven rounds long (short). After six rounds, Air India and Airport Authority of India were tied with 10 match points and both were facing far weaker teams.

 

Airport Authority of India beat the local team Madhya Pradesh-A 4-0 while for Air India, the score was 3.5-0.5 against Gujarat.

And since Air India had beaten AAI in their direct encounter, they took the first place on the tiebreak.

 While AAI took the second place.

 

Also Read:

  1. Nat. Teams 07: Air India crash
  2. Nat. Teams 05+06: Air India, AAI fall under the speeding train
  3. Nat. Teams 02-04: Top Seeds AAI lose to Air India

 

PGN for Open and Women

All Photos by Gopakumar Sudhakaran

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