GM Krishnan Sasikiran relegated to 2nd place in the first preliminary round of the Sparkassen Online Open
On Saturday at 2pm sharp the first tournament of this year's Sparkassen Chess Trophy started. The preliminary round in the Sparkassen Online Open on lichess.org. Rapid chess games were played in the innovative variant "No Castling Chess". In the course of the tournament, you could tell that the fun in this dynamic game grew from game to game and 112 participants had a lively afternoon. One grandmaster took the chance to be part of the 48th International Dortmund Chess Days and participated under the nickname "g3God": Grandmaster Krishnan Sasikiran from India, current Elo 2647. Thus the favourite among the 112 participants was clear.
At the head of the field, Sasikiran won the first five of the seven rounds in the Swiss system. But the "RebelJohnny", Amir Ali Ghafourian from Iran, was able to keep up and was also at 5/5, so that the preliminary decision would come in the sixth round. The Iranian had White and in the middlegame chose the approach of moving his king to g1, while the grandmaster with Black left his king in the centre and relied on piece play. Around move 20, Sasikiran surprised his 21-year-old opponent and won two pawns, so everything looked like a win for the favourite. But in chess without castling the kings are never quite so safe, that could be observed all afternoon. And so Sasikiran made a gross mishap, Ghafourian took both rooks from him and won the game! Here you can find the complete game for replay: https://lichess.org/RiKDX2v3
That cleared the way for the tournament win and with a short draw in the last round Ghafourian secured sole first place with 6.5/7! Sasikiran finished the tournament in second place after a nice win in the final round. In 3rd to 8th place followed the players with a strong score of 5.5 points from 7 games, which was exactly what was needed to enter the final on 17.7. There, the Top 8 from today will play with the Top 8 from the preliminary round tournaments on Sunday tomorrow and Monday. Two more chances for you to enter the final, where the invitation to the 49th International Dortmund Chess Days 2022 will be at stake!
Final table:
1. rebelJohnny 6,5/7
2. g3God 6/7
3. MichiB 5,5/7
3. schmetzger 5,5/7
5. Alaba27123 5.5/7
6. chessmalanders 5.5/7
7. Woodpegeti 5.5/7
8. Rochade_Augsburg 5,5/7
Complete final standings and all games: https://lichess.org/swiss/V9eOJ6Pt
The final score is subject to cheating control, although the whole tournament seems to have been run extremely fairly! The games will certainly be analysed in more detail afterwards with regard to "NC Chess" and give nice material to explore this chess variant. The tournament continues tomorrow, 11 July, at 2 pm. Simply register by 1 p.m., please with brief details of clear names: https://lichess.org/team/sparkassen-chess-trophy-dortmund-2021