By IANS
New Delhi : Grandmaster (GM) Marat Dzhumaev of Uzbekistan emerged as the sole leader, defeating Igor Kurnosov of Russia after the sixth round of the Parsvnath International chess tournament here Wednesday.
Playing with black pieces, Dzhumaev started with pet Pirc defense, which gave him the dynamic balance, but in the initial stages Kurnosov maintained the pressure. It was only in the endgame that the Russian erred and Dzhumaev made no mistakes to pocket full points from the tie.
With this win, Dzhumaev took his tally to an enviable six points from as many consecutive victories. He is now a half point clear of his nearest rivals Ehsan Ghaem Maghami of Iran, Spaniard Elizbar Ubilava, India’s Indian GM Surya Shekhar Ganguly and triple GM norm-holder G.B. Prakash, who all have five and a half points apiece.
GM norm-holder Abhijeet Gupta and International Master (IM) Tania Sachdev also won their respective sixth round game against Atanu Lahiri and Soumya Ranjan Mishra and thereby remained in reckoning for top honours with five points apiece.
Top results after Round six: Igor Kurnosov (RUS, 5) lost to Marat Dzhumaev (UZB, 6); G.B. Prakash (IND, 5.5) drew with Saidali Iuldachev (UZB, 5); Ehsan Ghaem Maghami (IRI, 5.5) beat Sapat Batyrov (TKM, 4.5); R.R. Laxman (IND, 4.5) lost to S.S. Ganguly (IND, 5.5); Elizbar Ubilava (ESP, 5.5) beat Safin Shukrat (UZB, 4.5); Nguyen Anh Dung (VIE, 5) drew with K. Rathnakaran (IND, 5); Mahjoob Morteza (IRI, 5) drew with S. Arun Prasad (IND, 5); Abhijit Kunte (IND, 5) beat Arjun Tiwari (IND, 4.5); Aditya Udeshi (IND, 4) lost to Enamul Hossain (BAN, 5); Atanu Lahiri (IND, 4) lost to Abhijeet Gupta (IND, 5); Tania Sachdev (IND, 5) beat Soumya Ranjan Mishra (IND, 4); Ghane Shoozat (IRI, 4) lost to Debashish Das (IND, 5); Bitan Banerjee (IND, 5) beat Darban Morteza (IRI, 4)