Grandmaster Krishnan Sasikiran outplayed compatriot former World Junior girls champion GM Koneru Humpy to jump into joint lead in the 18th North Sea Cup Category 15 GM tournament in Esbjerg, Denmark.
Overnight leader top seed Alexey Dreev of Russia played out a draw with fellow-GM Michal Krasenkow of Poland and was joined at the top by GM Bruzon Lazaro of Cuba, who crushed GM Peter Heine Neilsen of Denmark.
After the end of the second round the three leaders have 1.5 points each in their kitty and are followed by GM Luke McShane of England, Danish duo of Lars Schandorff and Curt Hansen Krasenkow, Lenier Dominguez of Cuba and Krasenkow who all have 1 point each in their kitty having drawn both the games played so far in the tournament.
Hastings champion Nielsen was left rubbing his wound on just a half point while Humpy is yet to open her account in this 10-players all-play-all tournament.
Sasikiran knew he would have to work hard and he did precisely that against Humpy, who appears to be out of form.
Having drawn the first game against McShane, Sasikiran went all out for a victory and was just rewarded as Humpy played too rashly.
It was an English opening where Sasikiran surprised his younger opponent right in the opening by going for a rather offbeat set-up.
Humpy did well to get out of the initial phase unscathed and was placed well to even claim some advantage but as the game progressed the Guntur girl failed to cope with the wizard from Chennai.
The middle game had all the thrills with Sasikiran leaving a few weaknesses around his king to collect a useless queenside pawn but as the dust settled Humpy realised that Sasi's judgement was perfect.
Embarking on an attack against the King, Humpy was left repenting as Sasikiran s pieces came back to the rescue act just in time and the extra material started to have a telling effect. Humpy resigned after 44 moves.
While the first round had just one decisive result with Dreev accounting for Humpy, Lazaro made it two on Saturday with his exemplary technique that left Nielsen panting. Having mastered the unusual variants, Lazaro went for a position that gave him ample chances to play for an advantage and got it when Nielsen erred in the middle game.
The Dane was left with a passive position just after move 15 and his state deteriorated steadily to allow the knockout punch on move 28 when Lazaro sacrificed an exchange to rip apart the king side. The game lasted just two more moves thereafter.
It was a cool outing for Dreev as Krasenkow failed to press for an advantage with his white pieces. A master of the Semi Slav, Dreev stuck to his principles against the Queen pawn and had little difficulty in neutralizing white's advantage out of the opening.
The piece got exchanged at regular intervals and Krasenkow drew vide repetition of moves.
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