2024-04-07 05:34:42
Nurgyul Salimova suffered her first loss at the World Women’s Chess Challengers tournament in Toronto.
In the game of the third round, the Bulgarian lost with the black pieces to the Indian Vaishali Rameshbabu after 33 moves of play. In this way, the 20-year-old Salimova remains with one point in her asset.
The 22-year-old Vaishali and Salimova, who are the two youngest participants among the ladies, played the classic version of the Russian Party. The match moved extremely slowly, and in the first three hours of it, the two played only 18 moves. However, Vaishali was the first to decide on bolder actions, and this brought her dividends.
On move 14, the Indian sacrifices her knight on f7. The sacrifice wasn’t incorrect, but it didn’t give Vaishali a positional advantage either. However, Salimova did not read the situation and made two consecutive weak moves, which turned the position from completely equal to lost. Vaishali was left with four more pawns on the board going into the endgame and the Bulgarian saw no point in resisting any longer.
Sunday is the fourth round of the Challengers Tournament. In it, Salimova will play the white pieces with the other Indian – Humpi Koneru. To date, 37-year-old Koneru has three draws and 1.5 points to her credit.
The leader in the ranking is China’s Tan Zhongyi, who has 2.5 points. The winner of the tournament will play for the world title with China’s Jiu Wenjun.