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Chennai Chess Olympiad: India ‘B’ team wins bronze in Open section; India ‘A’ women also finish third

The India ‘B’ team settled for a bronze medal in the Open section while the India ‘A’ women’s side also finished third in the 44th Chess Olympiad here on Tuesday.

India ‘B’ defeated Germany 3-1 in their final round match to end at third position.

Uzbekistan sprung a surprise by bagging the gold medal with a 2-1 win over the Netherlands ahead of a strong Armenian team, which beat Spain 2.5-1.5 in the final round, in the Open section.

The top-seeded India ‘A’ women’s team crashed to a 1-3 defeat in the 11th and final round to USA to see it’s gold medal hopes evaporate. The Koneru Humpy-led team finished third.

War-torn Ukraine won an emotional gold in the women’s event, pipping Georgia to the top prize.

Uzbekistan beat the Netherlands in the final round thanks to Jakhongir Vakhidov’s win on board 4. They edged out Armenia on the basis of a better tie-break score. The Uzbeks remained unbeaten through the 11 rounds and finished with 19 match points. India ‘B’ ended up with 18 points for third place.

It was the second bronze medal for India in the Olympiad, replicating its feat in the 2014 edition. The experienced B Adhiban, who was part of the team in 2014 added to his medal collection while it was the first for young stars D Gukesh, who was in spectacular form during the tournament, R Praggnanandhaa, Nihal Sarin and Raunak Sadhwani.

In the women’s section, top player Koneru Humpy and R Vaishali drew their games against Gulrukhba Tokhirjonova and Irina Krush respectively. The defeats for Tania Sachdev at the hands of Carissa Yip and Bhakthi Kulkarni to Tatev Abrahamyan hurt the India ‘A’ team’s chances of a gold medal.
The closing ceremony of the 44th Chess Olympiad was held at the Jawaharlal Nehru indoor stadium in Chennai on August 9, 2022. Photo: Twitter/@chennaichess22

A glittering ceremony, attended by Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin, marked the conclusion of the world event.