Grandmaster Surya Shekhar Ganguly bounced back into the reckoning for a medal with a crushing victory over Levan Pantsulaia of Georgia in the 11th round of the World Juniors chess championship in Nakhchivan, Azerbaijan.
Top seed Shakhriyar Mamedyarov of Azerbaijan remained at the top of the table after a draw with Sergei Azarov of Belarus in a Ruy Lopez game, lasting 26 moves.
Mamedyarov has 8.5 points in his kitty with just two more rounds remaining in this 50-player championship.
Azarov and Sergey Erenburg of Israel followed the leader on 8 points while Ganguly, seeded fifth, moved to joint fourth place on 7.5 points along with Kadir Guseinov of Azerbaijan.
The other Indian hope, Grandmaster Pendyala Harikrishna tried hard but failed to break the defences of Vugar Gashimov of Azerbaijan and had to settle for a truce after a long drawn battle. Harikrishna is in a pack of five players on 7 points and is still in with a chance for a medal should he do well in the remaining games.
In the girls' section, Nana Dzagnidze of Georgia stretched her lead by a whopping two-point margin, outclassing Azerbaijani Afag Khudaverdieva. Nana has amassed 8.5 points so far in the championship and is now assured of the title.
Dronavalli Harika received a jolt in her quest for a silver medal after she went down fighting to Ekaterina Ubiennykh of Russia.
As a result of this result, Zeinab Mamedjarova of Azerbaijan moved to sole second position on 6.5 points while Harika slipped to joint third spot along side Ubiennykh and Cristina Calotescu of Romania. Harika's chances for a medal are still bright provided she does well against Calotescu in her next round game.
The other Indian girls in with a chance is Asian junior girls' champion Tania Sachdev, who drew with compatriot Eesha Karavade and took her tally to 5.5 points. Tania is placed on sole sixth position but Eesha went out of contention after this draw, as she was half a point behind Tania.
Ganguly had the advantage of white pieces against Pantsulaia and he gave it a real hard try. The Georgian employed the Sicilian Nazdorf against which Ganguly restored his faith in the Classical variation that has been holding his forte for many years now.
Obviously well-prepared, Pantsulaia played the opening quite well and managed an evenly balanced position with chances for both sides. The queens got traded on the 36th move and thereafter Ganguly pushed his pawns on the queen side to win a piece. The resulting endgame might still have been a draw with correct play but Pantsulaia erred and lost after 101 moves.
Harikrishna got the game transposed into less trodden variation but did not succeed in getting the desirable result against Gashimov. Playing white, the Indian encountered an off beat move order in a queen pawn game and subsequent exchanges led to an endgame where Hari could not do much. The peace treaty was signed after 89 moves.
