Indian women's unbeaten streak at the 2024 FIDE Chess Olympiad was broken on Thursday (September 19, 2024) as they were stunned 2.5-1.5 by Poland in Budapest. The team's first loss in eight rounds means that they no longer are the sole leaders in the tournament, which has three more rounds to go. (More Sports News)
India suffered an early setback with Monika Socko beating R. Vaishali with black pieces. Divya Deshmukh levelled the score for India by prevailing over Aleksandra Maltsevskaya. But Harika Dronavalli lost to Alina Kashlinskaya, as the Polish side surged to a 2-1 lead.
In the final game, Vantika Agrawal found herself in a must-win situation and was on course to do that too. But after a queen exchange, Alicja Sliwicka held firm to hold Vantika to a draw, as the Indian squandered her winning position and the team suffered their first defeat in this edition of the Chess Olympiad.
Following the defeat, it is a three-way tie for the top spot between India, Kazakhstan and Poland in the women’s section after eight rounds, as each team now has 14 match points.
Earlier, in round 7, Vaishali and Vantika had put up impressive performances to lead the team to victory over Georgia on Wednesday. Vaishali and Vantika notched up wins against Lela Javakhishvili and Bella Khotenashvili as Indian women thumped second seeds Georgia 3-1.
With D Harika settling for a draw with Nana Dzagnidze and Divya Deshmukh being held by Nino Batsiashvili from a better position, it was Vantika who handled her time pressure extremely well to play almost 20 moves with just about a minute on her clock to win her game and seal India's seventh straight victory.
(With PTI inputs)
