Tata Steel Chess: Anand beats Xiong for his first victory
EINDHOVEN,THENETHERLANDS:FIVETIME world champion Viswanathan Anand on Friday crashed through the defences of Jeffery Xiong of United States to score his first victory in the Tata Steel Masters chess tournament that moved to the iconic Eindhoven Soccer Stadium for a day.
The change of venue as part of the ‘chess-on-tour’ turned out to be a good omen for Anand who had been struggling thus far with one loss and three draws. The Indian was relentless in the round four match as he came up with some highly creative chess. It was a French Defense Winawer varation wherein none of the players castled throughout the game. Anand launched a king side attack pretty early with his white pieces and enjoyed spatial advantage in the middle game.
Xiong defended tenaciously but in the end Anand found a crucial central breakthrough after which the resulting rook and pawns endgame was a walk in the park. Anand moved to joint sixth spot with 2.5 points.
IN-FORM RASHID SHOOTS 66 TO GET INTO TOP-10
SENTOSA, SINGAPORE: Rashid Khan carded a five-under 66 to add to his 70 from the first round, to be placed Tied-seventh at the SMBC Singapore Open, here on Friday.
Rashid, who has five Top-10 finishes in last eight starts on Asian Tour since September 2019, six shots behind the leader and defending champion Jazz Janewattananond of Thailand who once again moved into contention with six-under-par 65 to lead the field at the halfway stage.
Four other Indians made the cut. Rahil Gangjee (70-71) was in tied-32nd place, while SSP Chawrasia (72-71) finished birdiebirdie to squeeze inside the cut line with Shiv Kapur (72-71) and Khalin Joshi (70-73) in tied-52nd.
LAHIRI TIED-74 AT AMERICAN EXPRESS
LA QUINTA, USA: India’s Anirban Lahiri shot two-under 70 in the first round of the American Express Golf tournament here.
The tournament is played over three courses -- La Quinta, Nicklaus Tournament and Stadium -and the cut is applied after the third round. The final round will be held at the Stadium Course.
Lahiri was returning to the event, which is played as a Pro-am, after a gap of two years.
The Indian was lying tied-74 and will play the tough Stadium Course on the second day and the La Quinta on Saturday. The last two times Lahiri has played at La Quinta, he had 64 each.
SHARMA MAKES CUT IN ABU DHABI
ABU DHABI: Shubhankar Sharma safely sailed into the weekend rounds of the 2020 Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship with a twounder 70 but he was not much happy with his iron play and approach shots.
At three-under 141 for 36 holes, he is tied-37th, while fellow Indian, Gaganjeet Bhullar (79-74) made an early exit from the tournament, as the cut fell at one-under 143.
Frenchman Francesco Laporta closed with a brilliant streak of five birdies over the last five holes to card a bogey-free 63 and overtook Matt Fitzpatrick whose blemish-free 67 in the morning had set the early clubhouse target.