Grandmaster Vantika Agrawal put on defiant performance as she defeated USA grandmaster Irina Krush, to help India draw with USA 2-2 in the ninth round of the women's section at the 45th Chess Olympiad on Friday. (More Sports News)
The Indian women, who had suffered an excruciating loss at the hands of Poland, got their acts together to keep their chances of winning a gold medal alive at the Olympiad.
The Indian think tank rested an out-of-form Grandmaster D Harika but it did not change the fortunes much on the top board as R Vaishali went down to Gulrukhbegim Tokhirjonova while Divya Deshmukh played out an easy draw as black against Carissa Yip.
On the fourth board, Tania Sachdev, who had a position of strength, could not find the best attacking moves to force matters and settled for a draw with Alice Lee. This left Vantika to equalise the score and the youngster played with a lot of heart and commitment to beat her higher-rated opponent as black.
In Round 8, Indian women suffered a painful defeat as they lost 2.5-1.5 to Poland. 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.
The draw to USA means Kazakhstan are threatening to overtake India on points as there is a good chance for them to beat Poland 2.5-1.5.
(With PTI inputs)
