Indian No 1 Harika Dronavalli won her third game at the Abu Dhabi International Chess Festival on Sunday. The world No 9 defeated Azerbaijan’s Aydin Suleymanli in the seventh round, which also enabled her to regain her standing in the top-10 in the points table.
Playing with white, Dronavalli opted for aggressive tactics against her 12-year-old opponent, who put up an equally tough fight to take the game to 40 moves.
Talking about the match, Dronavalli commented, “I got off to a great start and gained an advantage in the initial phases of the game but a few miscalculated moves from my end got me in a complicated position.”
She also added, “Although when we were both were under the pressure of the clock and both kings were under attack, I outplayed him with a few strategies of my own.”
Post completion of seven rounds of play, the 26-year-old has garnered four-and-a-half points, with three wins and three draws respectively. Her sole defeat came at the hands of Romanian Grand Master Bogdan-Daniel Deac in the fourth round.
On Monday, in the penultimate round of the nine game round-robin tournament, Dronavalli has been paired to take on Russian Ivan Rozum.