Abu Dhabi 2019 Round 7: Deep Sengupta fights back, Karthikeyan Murali falters in French

by Satanick Mukhuty - 09/08/2019

After suffering an unfortunate loss against Mohammad Amin Tabatabaei in round five, Deep Sengupta has taken charge once again as he registered his second consecutive victory in the seventh round against the strong Turkish Grandmaster Mustafa Yilmaz. On the other hand, Karthikeyan Murali missed an opportunity to punish his opponent Bartosz Socko in a French defense and had to settle for a draw. Playing in the top board, leader Jobava Baadur also drew his game against China's Ni Hua. Thus, maintaining his full point lead over the field with 6.5/7. With only two rounds of the event remaining, there are six players tied to 5.5/7 behind Jobava. Will any one of them be able to catch up with the leader? In this report we bring you photos, analyses, and more from the seventh round of 26th Abu Dhabi Masters 2019!

Deep Sengupta outplays Mustafa Yilmaz in the endgame

Deep Sengupta's English Opening got the better of the Turkish Grandmaster Mustafa Yilmaz | Photo: Rupali Mullick

Deep had the opportunity to take a serious initiative quite early, on move 26, but unfortunately he missed this chance and had to wait till the endgame to bring home the full point. Let us begin by looking at the critical moments from this encounter.

Deep Sengupta - Mustafa Yilmaz, Round 7

Black has just played the move 25...bxc5. The Indian Grandmaster recaptured here with 26.Bxc5 but a better idea would have been 26.Bd2 with the idea of going Rxc5 next after which White gets excellent pressure along the c-file and on the e5 pawn. Check annotations below for details.

Position after 40.Re8: Missing the strong Bd2 on move 26 led to the game eventually liquidating into a rook-bishop ending. White has a slight edge in the above position mainly because his king is more actively placed. Moreover, Black could potentially also face back-rank issues once White lodges his light-squared bishop on g6.

White indeed got his bishop to g6. Black couldn't pick up the a3 pawn owing to a weak back-rank, instead now he had to spent some tempos getting his king to a safer square.

This was the final critical moment of the game. Black played the move 44...Bb7 here which allowed White to pick up the e-pawn with 45.Re5, 44...Rd8 would have been a better defense instead.

Next, White picked up one more pawn on the kingside and from here it was game over for Black.

Karthikeyan misses an opportunity against Bartosz Soćko

Karthikeyan had an opportunity to seize an edge with a nice exchange sacrifice against the polish Grandmaster Bartosz Socko | Photo: Rupali Mullick

Karthikeyan played an unusual fianchetto of his light-squared bishop in the French and by move 11 it was already a new position on board.

Karthikeyan Murali - Bartosz Soćko, Round 7

White played the new move 11.g3 followed by 12.Bg2 next. Black could have continued solidly with 11...Nb6 here but in the game he chose a more ambitious plan.

Black went for a queenside expansion with a5 and b4 and developed his c8 bishop to a6. White has a brilliant resource here that was missed in the game can you see it?

15.Nf4! is what Karthikeyan could have played! The point is after 15...Bxf1 16.Rxf1 there's just too much pressure on the e6 point to deal with and the black king is still stuck in the middle of the board (check annotations below for variations). In the game however, 15.fxe6 fxe6 16.Bh3 was played after which the game slowly fizzled into a draw.

Ni Hua plays solid against Jobava!

Jobava's terrific winning spree was brought to an end in the seventh round as China's Ni Hua held the in-form Georgian Grandmaster to a draw | Photo: Rupali Mullick

After winning six games in a row the leader Jobava Baadur was up against the very strong Chinese Grandmaster Ni Hua. In a variation of Slav, the latter with white pieces chose to be super-solid against the in-form Georgian player. The game never really left equilibrium and was agreed to a draw without much ado after just thirty-eight moves.

Ni Hua - Jobava Baadur, Round 7

Position after 15...a6: White had the opportunity to create imbalances at this point by pushing 16.f4 but in the game 16.Nc4 was played which led to the exchange of dark-squared bishops on g3 after which the game never really went off-balance.

Aravindh Chithambaram drew GM Yuffa Daniil. Aravindh is paired up against compatriot Deep Sengupta in the penultimate round of the event. This is a match-up that would be interesting to follow | Photo: Rupali Mullick

The national triple-crown champion has been very solid throughout the event, not losing a single game in seven rounds!

Vaibhav Suri lost to Bartel Mateusz in the seventh round | Photo: Rupali Mullick

Vignesh N R lost to Mohammad Amin Tabatabaei | Photo: Rupali Mullick

Aryan Chopra couldn't keep his good performance from the previous round going as he lost to GM Antipov Mikhail AI.

Praggnananddhaa R. was held to a draw by Akash Pc. Iyer | Photo: Rupali Mullick

Results of round 7

Bo.	No.		Name	Rtg	Pts.	Result	Pts.		Name	Rtg	No.
1	2	GM	Ni Hua	2668	5	½ - ½	6	GM	Jobava Baadur	2584	26
2	14	GM	Karthikeyan Murali	2612	5	½ - ½	5	GM	Socko Bartosz	2625	10
3	9	GM	Esipenko Andrey	2625	4½	½ - ½	5	GM	Yakubboev Nodirbek	2574	28
4	4	GM	Maghsoodloo Parham	2656	4½	½ - ½	4½	GM	Can Emre	2593	22
5	13	GM	Bartel Mateusz	2612	4½	1 - 0	4½	GM	Vaibhav Suri	2591	24
6	15	GM	Aravindh Chithambaram Vr.	2607	4½	½ - ½	4½	GM	Yuffa Daniil	2571	30
7	29	GM	Aleksandrov Aleksej	2571	4½	½ - ½	4½	GM	Zubov Alexander	2607	16
8	36	GM	Aryan Chopra	2553	4½	0 - 1	4½	GM	Antipov Mikhail Al.	2599	18
9	25	GM	Santos Latasa Jaime	2586	4	½ - ½	4	GM	Kryvoruchko Yuriy	2686	1
10	31	GM	Paichadze Luka	2570	4	½ - ½	4	GM	Volokitin Andrei	2636	7
11	34	GM	Istratescu Andrei	2561	4	0 - 1	4	GM	Ter-Sahakyan Samvel	2632	8
12	11	GM	Indjic Aleksandar	2617	4	1 - 0	4	GM	Bajarani Ulvi	2515	42
13	37	GM	Sengupta Deep	2546	4	1 - 0	4	GM	Yilmaz Mustafa	2614	12
14	17	GM	Tabatabaei M.Amin	2601	4	1 - 0	4	IM	Vignesh N R	2466	52
15	53	IM	Shyaamnikhil P	2457	4	½ - ½	4	GM	Bai Jinshi	2599	19
16	87	CM	Aronyak Ghosh	2332	4	½ - ½	4	GM	Petrov Nikita	2595	20
17	21	GM	Abdusattorov Nodirbek	2594	4	1 - 0	4	IM	Krishna C R G	2444	57
18	23	GM	Petrosyan Manuel	2592	4	1 - 0	4	FM	Rathanvel V S	2367	78
19	130	WIM	Mahalakshmi M	2173	4	0 - 1	3½	GM	Sanal Vahap	2535	38
20	3	GM	Salem A.R. Saleh	2668	3½	1 - 0	3½	GM	Vasquez Schroeder Rodrigo	2496	46

Standings after round 7

Rk.	SNo		Name	FED	Rtg	Pts.	TB1	TB2	TB3
1	26	GM	Jobava Baadur	GEO	2584	6,5	0,0	2590	30,0
2	28	GM	Yakubboev Nodirbek	UZB	2574	5,5	0,0	2589	29,0
3	10	GM	Socko Bartosz	POL	2625	5,5	0,0	2550	30,5
4	14	GM	Karthikeyan Murali	IND	2612	5,5	0,0	2545	29,5
5	13	GM	Bartel Mateusz	POL	2612	5,5	0,0	2531	30,0
6	2	GM	Ni Hua	CHN	2668	5,5	0,0	2508	31,0
7	18	GM	Antipov Mikhail Al.	RUS	2599	5,5	0,0	2507	26,0
8	29	GM	Aleksandrov Aleksej	BLR	2571	5,0	0,0	2576	30,0
9	4	GM	Maghsoodloo Parham	IRI	2656	5,0	0,0	2575	33,5
10	30	GM	Yuffa Daniil	RUS	2571	5,0	0,0	2550	29,5
11	11	GM	Indjic Aleksandar	SRB	2617	5,0	0,0	2549	33,0
12	16	GM	Zubov Alexander	UKR	2607	5,0	0,0	2544	29,5
13	23	GM	Petrosyan Manuel	ARM	2592	5,0	0,0	2541	31,0
14	17	GM	Tabatabaei M.Amin	IRI	2601	5,0	0,0	2523	28,5
15	37	GM	Sengupta Deep	IND	2546	5,0	0,0	2512	28,5
16	22	GM	Can Emre	TUR	2593	5,0	0,0	2509	27,0
17	9	GM	Esipenko Andrey	RUS	2625	5,0	0,0	2505	29,0
18	21	GM	Abdusattorov Nodirbek	UZB	2594	5,0	0,0	2500	28,5
19	15	GM	Aravindh Chithambaram Vr.	IND	2607	5,0	0,0	2494	28,0
20	8	GM	Ter-Sahakyan Samvel	ARM	2632	5,0	0,0	2447	26,5

The penultimate round of the event begins from 6:30 p.m IST today. You can follow it live on the official YouTube Channel of Abu Dhabi Chess.

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