Today's Edition
Dubai (Aletihad)
Five players share the lead in Category A of the 24th Dubai Open tournament after four rounds at the Dubai Chess and Culture Club.
Yagiz Kaan Erdogmuş of Turkiye and India’s Aronyak Ghosh maintained their hold of the lead after the co-leaders drew their fourth-round game in a head-to-head clash.
They upped their score to 3.5 points and were joined in the leaderboard by Indian Grandmasters Raunak Sadhwani and SP Sethuraman of India and GM Mahammad Muradli of Azerbaijan, who also won their games to move up the standings.
The 13-year-old Erdoğmuş, who is currently the youngest player to complete all Grandmaster norms, and Ghosh, whose 2528 Elo rating makes him one of the world’s highest-rated International Masters, traded queens after just seven moves and then agreed to a draw by move 30 after repeating moves.
Muradli, a two-time national champion, defeated local hero IM Ibrahim Sultan in 46 moves of a Slav defence. The Azerbaijan player was already in total control by move 12 when Sultan committed an errant rook move that allowed white to win material and launch a searing attack against the black king.
Former Asian champion Sethuraman sacrificed his queen for two rooks on the 34th move, but his major pieces and passed pawn on the b-file proved more than enough compensation as he scored the full point against Greece’s GM Evgenios Ioannidis. Sadhwani defeated IM Oliver Dimakiling of the Philippines with the black pieces in a Pirc Defense.
In Category B, women’s IM Srishti Pandey won the battle on the first board against compatriot Taksh Sharma, while Yousef A Alhassadi of Lebanon defeated AIM Vihaan Dumir of India to grab the joint leadership after four rounds.
The nine-round tournament will continue until June 2. Each player is allotted a thinking time of 90 minutes, with 30 seconds added after each move. A total of $52,000 in cash prizes will be awarded to the winners.
