Indian trio in second spot, Normunds leads

Gupte outplayed Miroshnichenko right from the opening with black pieces but the later managed to wriggle out in mutual time scramble leaving the Indian Grandmaster slip to joint second spot from what looked a certain shared lead.

Parimarjan Negi also pushed hard but Ni Hua of China managed a miraculous escape out of a Berlin defense, while Sandipan Chanda held Vladimir Akopian of Armenia easily.

Miezes Normunds of Latvia, meanwhile, emerged as the sole leader on six points after beating Viorel Iordachescu of Moldova. It was a lucky victory by the Latvian who suffered earlier in the middle game.

With Normunds in front, the Indian trio of Gupta, Negi and Chanda are in close pursuit, half a point behind and givbing them company here are Akopian, Miroshnichenko, Ni Hua, Zaven Andriasian of Armenia, Mikheil Mchedlishvili of Georgia and Yuriy Kuzubov of Ukraine.

With just two rounds to go, the tournament is headed for a close finish as Gupta will take on Normunds in the penultimate round, while Chanda and Negi are left to settle it out between them.

The GM norm seekers, meanwhile, suffered a setback as Vishnu Prasanna went down to Kuzubov, who played black, and S Nitin could only manage a draw from a won endgame against Vladimir Baklan of Ukraine. These two along with Akshayraj Kore are still in with a chance for the Grandmaster norm but they need to score well in the last two rounds.

Former National champion and Vishwanathan Anand's second Surya Shekhar Ganguly brought himself back in contention at the expense of Tania Sachdev. Ganguly and G N Gopal have five points apiece along with Nitin and the next two rounds can guide them to a podium finish, provided they win both. MORE PTI Cor SSC