45th Chess Olympiad: Indian men’s, women’s teams register 2nd successive wins

The Indian men's and women's teams continued their winning streak at the 45th Chess Olympiad in Budapest, Hungary, securing back-to-back victories.

In the open section, the Indian men followed their convincing 4-0 win over Morocco in Round 1 with an identical scoreline against Iceland in Round 2.

Praggnanandhaa was rested and Gukesh was in the mix for Round 2, where he straightaway felt the pressure against his opponent GM Vatnar Stefansson.

Despite being under time pressure while playing with the back pieces, he ultimately prevailed over Vatnar to give India a 1-0 lead in the open section.

Arjun Erigaisi, meanwhile, exerted pressure on his opponent, GM Hannes Stefansson, by advancing his pawns in a ‘pawn stacking’ strategy that confused the Icelandic player, ultimately leading to his defeat and giving India a 2-0 lead.

Vidit Gujarati then didn’t commit any mistakes and played flawlessly in his game against Hilmir Freyr Heimisson securing another victory and extending India’s lead to 3-0 over the Icelanders.

Eventually, GM Pentala Harikrishna completed the clean sweep, defeating Helgi Ass Gretarsson to seal a 4-0 victory for India.

Indian women beat the Czech Republic

Meanwhile, the Indian women’s team mirrored their Round 1 performance, repeating their 3.5-0.5 victory, this time against the Czech Republic.

While Tania Sachdev was held to a draw by Martina Korenova, Divya Deshmukh and Vantika Agrawal defeated Natalie Kanakova and Tereza Rodshtein, respectively, to give India a 2-0 lead.

Dronavalli Harika then sealed the win for India with a hard-fought victory over Julia Movsesian, taking the score to 3-0, with Tania playing out a draw ti make the final scoreline 3.5-0.5.