Indian men hold formidable Hungary

Grandmaster Abhijit Kunte outplayed highly rated GM Zoltan Almasi as India's men's team drew 2-2 against a formidable Hungarian team in the fifth round of the 34th Chess Olympiad in Istanbul on Thursday.

The women had another reversal of fortunes when they went down to Bulgaria 0.5-2.5.

Germany retained the top position in the men's event with a hard earned 3-1 victory over Israel, which took their tally to 16.5 points.

Russia scored a thumping 3.5-0.5 win over Brazil to shoot into the the second spot.

India, with 13.5 points, were placed joint sixth.

In the women's event, China beat Kazakhstan 2.5-0.5 and joined Georgia at the top with 12 points. The Indian women are poorly placed on 8 points.

Abhijit Kunte played a fine attacking game to oust Almasi on the second board to give his team the lead. With white pieces, Abhijit opened with the king pawn and the game took shape in a Ruy Lopez. In the middlegame, Abhijit sensed some attack on the kingside and opened a whole lot of options by deploying his queen rook over to the kingside.

Almasi remained unfazed by Abhijit's heroics and continued his counterattack on the queenside. On the 27th move Abhijit sacrificed a bishop to rip open the king position. Since taking the Bishop was futile, Almasi tried controlling the center but his position was already beyond repairs. The knock-out punch was delivered by Abhijit on his 31st turn.

On the top board, GM Krishanan Sasikiran went down fighting to GM Peter Leko. Leko, who matches against the likes of Anand, Kasparov and Kramnik, was amazed with the Indian's opening preparation and deep positional sense.

In the Sicilian Scheveningen opted by Sasikiran with black pieces, Leko went for Keres attack and got a routine position.

In the middlegame, Sasikiran sacrificed a piece and looked better at one stage as he had four pawns as compensation for the lost material. Leko had to sweat hard but in the end, his immense experience at the top level came to his rescue. After 79 moves, Sasikiran called it a day.

On third board, rising sensation IM Pendalya Harikrishna continued to impress with an easy draw against GM Guala Sax. In his pet French defence, Harikrishan obtained easy equality soon after the opening and as he deployed his forces on the right squares, Sax had no option but to go for exchange of queens.

The position was unclear when Sax offered the draw by inviting for queen's trade but Harikrishna agreed to the truce.

On the fourth board IM D V Prasad drew with R Ruck to guide India to another impressive result. Prasad did not get much from his unconventional move order against the Sicilian defence and the pieces got exchanged in tandem once the game entered middlegame.

In the ensuing endgame Ruck had the Bishop pair advantage but Prasad closed all entries before signing the peace after 41 moves.

WGM Vijayalakshmi drew with M Voiska on the top board on an otherwise tough day for Indian women. Viji played the Engilsh opening with white pieces and faced a set-up akin to the Kings Indian defence.

After getting a slight edge in the middlegame, Viji pressed hard for victory but timely exchange of pieces by her opponent saw advantage slipping from her end and the game entered rook and pawns endgame where Viji had a pawn deficit.

However, the Bulgarian did not press much and settled for a draw with exchange of rooks.

On board two, Subbaraman Meenakshi fell in a well-known opening trap and allowed S Aleksieva to seize the initiative very early. After defending a passive position for a long time, Meenakshi finally succumbed to the pressure and lost the game in 36 moves.

Pallavi Shah's lacklustre play in the opening cost her dearly as E Djingarova launched an offence against her king in the middlegame arising out of a Sicilian defence where the former was white.

The game lasted only 24 moves.