2024-09-22 12:15:28
The men’s and women’s national teams of Bulgaria achieved victories in the penultimate tenth round of the Chess Olympiad in Budapest.
The men’s team, led by head coach Kiril Georgiev, beat Sweden with 2.5:1.5 points. The Scandinavians took the lead after Martin Lokander beat Grigor Grigorov on the fourth board, but the Bulgarian team managed to turn around through Arkadiy Naidich on the second board, who won with the white pieces against Erik Blomqvist, and Momchil Petkov on the third board, who won with the black pieces Tiger Person.
The success was ensured by Ivan Cheparinov on the first board, who with the black pieces finished a draw against the Swedish star Nils Grandelius.
Among the ladies, the Bulgarian team, led by Petar G. Arnaudov, managed to win against Israel also with 2.5:1.5 points. The European champions from Budva struck the first blow of the match after former world champion Antoineta Stefanova defeated Marcel Efroimski on the first board with the white pieces. Israel managed to equalize through Dana Kochavi, who also with white won against Gergana Peycheva. Victoria Radeva, however, gave a new advance to the Bulgarian women. The Plovdiv native outplayed Noga Orian to record her fifth win in eight games since the start of the tournament, and she is still unbeaten. The last game that ended was between Masha Klinova and Nurgyul Salimova, and after more than five hours of play they drew, which secured the victory for Bulgaria.
After today’s round, both Bulgarian national teams have 14 match points each, with the men’s team in 20th place and the women’s team in 16th position.
For the men, the champion became known a round before the end. This is the Indian squad that defeated the No. 1 seeded USA team by 2.5 to 1.5 points in the tenth round. Thus, the Indians have 19 match points out of a possible 20, and even if they lose in the last round, only China can match them, but not surpass them.
In the women’s category, before the final round, India and Kazakhstan share the top spot with 17 match points each. Next are the USA and Poland with 16 game points each.