Ravi shocks GM Persson

International Master-elect T S Ravi provided the sole victory for India, upsetting Grandmaster Hillarp Persson, in the sixth round of the Lost Boys International Open Chess tournament in Amsterdam.

IM R B Ramesh and S Kidambi lost their boards to highly rated GM Tregubov of Russia and GM Epishin respectively.

Ravi played the Nimzo-Indian defence as black and the game transposed into Caro-Kann Panov-Botwinnik variation where white was left with an isolated pawn on 'd4'.

Hillarp sacrificed a pawn on the Queenside to get a better pawn structure. Both players went into severe time trouble and had to make 10 moves in under a minute with a complicated position on the board.

At this stage Hillarp went for a wild attack giving another pawn but Ravi defended well and won the game in 58 moves.

Ramesh suffered a minor setback to his GM norm prospects when he went down to GM Tregubov in a long drawn out ending afer getting a good position from the opening.

From the black side of the Kings Indian 'g3' system, Ramesh introduced a novelty early and obtained equality. He won a pawn in the middlegame but had to give it back a few moves later to enter into a Queen, Rook and a Knight each position with equal pawns.

Ramesh wrongly exchanged the Queens and allowed Tregubov to obtain a dangerous 'b' passer which decided the game in the latter's favour in 60 moves to leave Ramesh with 4 points.

Kidambi played the Russian system against Epishin and the position was roughly equal after the early exchange of Queens. Kidambi missed a few oppurtunies to get a drawn Rook and pawn endgame and ultimately lost the game in a Knight and pawn ending.

IM Saravanan tricked his opponent into an inferior version of King's Indian Saemisch from the white side of the Pirc defence. Saravanan won a pawn in the middlegame but allowed Rebers to enter into an opposite coloured Bishop ending and drew the game to move to 3.5 points.

IM Konguvel was involved in a short draw from the black side of the Sicilian Dragon variation after his opponent decided to repeat the moves by attacking Konguvels' Queen with his Rook in 20 moves. Konguvel was running a slight temperature and decided not to take any chances.

On the top board GM Gurevich lost a pawn quite early but complicated the position enough to confuse GM Milov, from the white side of the Nimzo Indian defence and won the game with a neat Bishop sacrifice to move into joint lead with GM Tregubov and GM Ivan Sokolov with 5.0 points.

Other results: GM M.Gurevich (5.0) beat GM Milov (4.5); GM Tregubov (5.0) beat IM R.B.Ramesh (4.0); GM Van der Sterren (4.5) lost to GM Ivan Sokolov (5.0); GM Schekechev (4.5) drew with GM Piket (4.5); Kidambi (3.0) lost to GM Epishin (4.0); GM Hillarp Persson (3.0) lost to T.S.Ravi (4.0); IM Saravanan (3.5) drew with E Rebers (3.5); J Jens (3.0) drew with IM Konguvel (3.0).