Pinoy GM Gomez keeps title bid alive
Grandmaster (GM) John Paul Gomez continued his winning ways to keep the Philippine afloat but countryman GM Richard Bitoon yielded in the sixth round of SDAT-RMK 4th Chennai Open Grand Master Chess Tournament yesterday in Chennai, India.
The Biñan, Laguna bet Gomez toppled Navin Kanna of India to raise his total to 5.0 points and climb into a share of fifth to 15th places in the company of GM Martin Kravtsiv of Ukraine, GM Ziaur Rahman of Bangladesh, GM Hoang Thanh Trang of Hungrary, Ma Qun and Zeng Chongsheng of China, GM Sheturaman SP, International Masters (IMs) Himashu Sharma, Konguvel Ponnuswamy, Karthikeyan P and Debashis Das of India, conqueror of Bitoon.
The Medellin, Cebu ace Bitoon, on the other hand, was stuck at 4 points and dropped into a tie for 41st to 77th places that included compatriots GMs Mark Paragua and Oliver Barbosa.
The Bulacan-based Paragua split a point with Hemant Sharma of India while the Taytay, Rizal native Barbosa routed Harini S of India.
Top-seed GM Aleksej Aleksandrov of Belarus beat IM Jahongir Vakhidov of Uzbekistan to score 5.5 points and create a four-way tie for first place with GM Mikhailo Oleksienko of Ukraine, IM Vaibhav Suri of India and Yu Ruiyuan of China.
In the seventh round, Gomez will meet IM Karthikeyan; Bitoon takes on Hemant; Barbosa plays Pradeep Kumar of India and Paragua tangles with Navalgund Niranjan of India. /Correspondent Marlon Bernardino
