Aditya upsets Adhiban

While an 1811-rated player was shockingly sharing the lead after three rounds — Kushal lost with black against Andrey Esipenko on Thursday — the lowest-rated player in the leading pack after four rounds has a 2470 rating. Samant Aditya, from India, defeated his compatriot Adhiban to remain among the players with perfect scores after four rounds in Sitges.

Aditya got his IM title just six months ago, at 15 years of age. In the fifth round, he will face a third Indian player in a row (no fewer than 65 Indian representatives have made their way to Catalonia), as he will get the white pieces against Karthikeyan Murali on board 4.

Sharing first place with the aforementioned Aditya and Karthikeyan are Hans Niemann, Kirill Alekseenko, Karen Grigoryan and Puranik Abhimanyu.

Playing white against Adhiban, Aditya made the most of his opponent’s questionable decision of leaving his king in the centre.

White has both a better structure and better chances to create an attack. There followed 20.Rxd6 Qxd6 21.bxc5 Qxc5 and now, crucially, the e6-pawn falls.

After 22.Qxe6+ Kf8 23.c3 Rb8, the younger Indian spent close to 10 minutes before playing the strong 24.Ng5, simplifying into a winning position.

Adhiban had nothing better than 24...fxg5 25.Qxg6, but after 25...gxh4 26.Re3, the black monarch’s precarious situation cannot be dealt with successfully. The rook is ready to join the attack, with decisive effect.

Sicilian Dragon: The Real Deal! Part 1-3

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Black is doomed. Resignation came after 26...Qa3 27.Qe6 Qc1+ 28.Kh2. A fine, quick victory by yet another talented youngster from the South Asian chess powerhouse.

GM Esipenko (2678) and GM Alekseenko (2672), both competing in the tournament under the @FIDE_chess flag, are staying up till late tonight, maybe to take advantage of the mild night and practice another sport... Will they also be facing at #SunwaySitges during the tournamen?t pic.twitter.com/UAxeuctqGq
— Sunway Chess Festival (@SunwayChessOpen) December 16, 2022

In round 3, Aryan Chopra could have suffered a similar upset loss to the one suffered by Adhiban, but his opponent, Ortig Nigmatov from Uzbekistan, did not find the precise path to victory in a very complicated ending with two rooks and a light-squared bishop per side. Our in-house expert Karsten Müller analysed the instructive position.

Standings after round 4

Rk.	SNo		Name	sex	FED	Rtg	Pts.	TB1	TB2	TB3
1	18	GM	Puranik Abhimanyu			2616	4	9	11,5	11,50
2	40	IM	Samant Aditya S			2470	4	8	10	10,00
3	8	GM	Alekseenko Kirill			2672	4	7,5	9,5	9,50
4	2	GM	Niemann Hans Moke			2698	4	7,5	9	9,00
5	14	GM	Karthikeyan Murali			2620	4	7,5	8,5	8,50
6	15	GM	Grigoryan Karen H.			2619	4	7	9	9,00
7	3	GM	Van Foreest Jorden			2690	3,5	9	11	9,25
	16	GM	Aryan Chopra			2618	3,5	9	11	9,25
9	23	GM	Aravindh Chithambaram Vr.			2607	3,5	9	10,5	8,75
10	57	IM	Nigmatov Ortik			2439	3,5	8,5	10,5	8,75
11	28	GM	Svane Frederik			2568	3,5	8,5	10	8,25
	76	IM	Abdurakhmonov Mukhammadali			2397	3,5	8,5	10	8,25
13	6	GM	Esipenko Andrey			2678	3,5	8	10	8,50
	19	GM	Safarli Eltaj			2616	3,5	8	10	8,50
15	1	GM	Yu Yangyi			2728	3,5	8	10	8,25
	20	GM	Durarbayli Vasif			2612	3,5	8	10	8,25
	34	GM	Gines Esteo Pedro Antonio			2500	3,5	8	10	8,25
18	75	IM	Tahay Alexis			2400	3,5	8	8,5	6,75
19	22	GM	Kollars Dmitrij			2610	3,5	7,5	9,5	8,00
20	11	GM	Demchenko Anton			2632	3,5	7,5	9	7,75
21	13	GM	Petrosyan Manuel			2621	3,5	7	9	8,00
22	37	IM	Aditya Mittal			2479	3,5	7	8,5	7,25
23	35	GM	Sankalp Gupta			2485	3,5	6,5	7,5	6,50
24	9	GM	Korobov Anton			2662	3,5	6	7,5	6,50

...326 players

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