Harikrishna rises to joint second in Tata Steel Chess

Indias grand master Pentala Harikrishna rose to the second position after three rounds of the ongoing Tata Steel chess tournament here.

He shares the place with four other players, including World No. 1 Magnus Carlsen of Norway, each sitting pretty on two points after the third round ended late on Monday.

Ukraine's World No. 14 Pavel Eljanov, with two-and-a-half points, is the current leader in this elite tournament that draws the world's best chess players every year.

Harikrishna, ranked No. 11 with an ELO of 2770, has notched up one victory against his Indian counterpart Adhiban Baskaran and two draws against World No. 7 Levon Aronian of Armenia and Eljanov.

"I am satisfied with the way I am playing," Harikrishna said after his draw against Eljanov with black on Monday.

"But there is a long way to go still. I have 10 more games to play."

"It was an interesting opening and we got to a position where we could have repeated our moves. But Eljanov played to win and I got into a slightly better position. Finally though, it was a rook endgame and we shared the point," he added.

The Indian star takes on Sergey Karjakin of Russia later on Tuesday, with white.

He scored his first victory on Sunday night, outsmarting Adhiban in a long drawn out game. They were locked in the Arkhangelsk Variation for close to four hours, until Harikrishna lured him into a trap in the endgame.

--IANS

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