John Veny wins maiden National U-14 chess title
Kerala is no longer the underperformer in chess it was for a long time. The State now has two players in India’s top 10 — Nihal Sarin and S. L. Narayanan. The last one month saw two Kerala boys claiming National titles.
That is something the State is not very used to — producing National champions in succession. After Gowtham Krishna lifted the National Under-12 championship at Mandya last month, John Veny Akkarakaran won the National Under-14 championship at Ahmedabad recently.
John began as the 13th seed and came up with a fine performance to score over higher seeds. He posted victories over second seed Mohammad Imran, fourth seed Daakshin Arun, fifth seed Mayank Chakraborty and seventh seed Sumer Arsh Shaik.
His only defeat came at the hands of top seed Om Kadam. He finished the tournament with nine points from 11 rounds.
His last game, with Abhash Saikya, ended in a draw and that saw him tying for the top spot with Gaurang Bagwe, but a better tie-break score gave him the title.
This is the maiden National title for the 13-year-old from Kozhikode. In 2017, he was the runner-up at the National Under-9 championship.