Indian Grandmasters Surya Shekhar Ganguly, S. L. Narayanan and S.P. Sethuraman beat their respective opponents to maintain the lead with three others after 3 rounds of the 20th Dubai Open Chess Championship at the Dubai Chess Club in Dubai, UAE. The Indian trio are tied with 3 points each together with top seed GM Yuriy Kryvoruchko and GM Alexander Zubov of Ukraine and GM Edurado Iturrizaga Bonelli of Venezuela.
Ganguly smashed the Sicilian Najdorf of compatriot GM Debashis Das in 29 moves. Narayanan crushed the Semi Slav defense of GM David Anton Guijarro of Spain in 49 moves. Sethuraman destroyed the Semi Slav defense of compatriot GM Shardul Gagare in 33 moves.
Kryvoruchko wrecked the Caro Kann defense of GM Levon Pantsulaia of Georgia in 51 moves. Zubov use the Gruenfeld Defense to turn back IM P. Iniyan in 31 moves. Iturrizaga used the Sicilian Defense to make short work of IM P. Karthikeyan, threatening mate in 29 moves.
Nineteen players are tied for 7th to 25th slots with 2.5 points each in the race for a total of $50,000 in cash prizes with a top prize of $13,000 for the champion.
A record 164 players from 33 countries are seeing action in the strong tournament including 36 Grandmasters, 24 International Masters, 5 Woman Grandmasters, 7 Woman International Masters, 16 FIDE Masters and 4 Woman FIDE Masters. Under the Patronage of Sheikh Rashid Bin Hamdan Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the tournament is a 9-round Swiss system with games scheduled 5:30 pm daily except for Saturday, 7 April, when two rounds are scheduled 10am and 6pm. Top games are broadcast live on the internet. Visit official site www.dubaichess.ae or find full results and standings in chess-results.com.
