2024 Budapest Olympiad Round 6: India in Sole Lead in Open and Women’s

Tournament Information

Information about the schedule, Lichess broadcast, and Lichess stream coverage can all be found in our preview article.

Lichess will be covering the Chess Olympiad with live camera feeds and rotating commentators: GM Illia Nyzhnyk, IM Eric Rosen, and FM Gauri Shankar! Make sure to tune in tomorrow September 18 at 13:00 UTC for Round 7 with our host GM Illia Nyzhnyk.

Schedule

Leaderboard (Open)

Overview (Open)

India is in the sole lead as it was once again in no trouble in its match against Hungary. Meanwhile, Vietnam has continued its upsurge as it drew gold medal contender China. Other important results include the USA's draw against Romania, which has greatly decreased the top seed's chances of gold, and Iran defeating Norway. Lithuania, whose 2500 rating average belies its strength, is also having an impressive Olympiad as it defeated Azerbaijan. On the individual level, GM Magnus Carlsen and GM Fabiano Caruana pressed against their opponents but were unable to win, costing them some rating for the draws; one player who pressed and won, though, was GM Arjun Erigaisi, who is on a perfect 6/6. Many fans around the globe are hoping to see him get to the exclusive 2800 club.

You can find more results here.

The Top Teams

The theme of today's round was long, grinding endgames — some won, some drawn. On the second (fixed) board, GM Gukesh Dommaraju and GM Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu played very solid games against their respective opponents GM Richard Rapport and GM Peter Leko. That meant that for team India to win, at least one of GM Arjun Erigaisi or GM Vidit Santosh Gujrathi had to win and the other draw. As it so happened, both of them won with very precise endgame play. With 99% accuracy for Arjun and 98% accuracy for Vidit, team India is proving that it has come ferociously prepared to win gold this year.

With team India's dominance, all eyes were on its closest rival: team China, led by world champion GM Ding Liren. On paper, China did not have the toughest opponent, but team Vietnam, initially ranked as the tournament's 21st seed, has been outperforming its expected score by miles. In round 6, Vietnam continued to prove its might as it drew China after GM Le Quang Liem ground down GM Ding Liren in a highly technical endgame, the well-known forte of Liem:

As GM Tuan Minh Tran pushed pawns in front of his king, though, GM Wang Yue was able to save the day for team China as his pieces slowly infiltrated White's weakened light squares:

Team Vietnam
Photo: Michal Walusza / FIDE

There were many other important saves during this round. A most welcome result for the Iranian team saw GM Parham Maghsoodloo defending a tough position against GM Magnus Carlsen. Initially, Carlsen's Caro-Kann sideline worked well; Maghsoodloo chose a very ambitious setup with h6-g5 and soon his uncaslted king proved to be too dangerously-placed. Somehow, though, Maghsoodloo was able to find a way to defend by keeping his compact structure intact and his pieces close to his king. Carlsen kept pushing for hours, especially so because the other three boards had already finished and Norway was staring down a loss if Carlsen would draw. His efforts were in vain, though, as Maghsoodloo kept defending well:

GM Fabiano Caruana of the USA kept pressing against GM Bogdan-Daniel Deac as well, but he also could do no better than draw the game, resulting in a drawn match for the USA against Romania:

The save of the day, however, had to be GM Valentin Dragnev's queen sacrifice against Jan-Krzysztof Duda, which came like a bolt from the blue. In a winning position, Duda had to munch on the material sacrificed; instead, he chose to forgo said material and kept his own threats on the board, but that meant that Dragnev could pounce with a well-timed sacrifice:

Lithuania's win against Azerbaijan was quite spectacular as GM Paulius Pultinevicius played a brilliant attacking game against former Candidates player GM Nijat Abasov:

GM Tomas Laurusas also played a dark-square maelstrom against GM Mahammad Muradli:

The Biggest Upsets (Games)

FM Jaime Rodriguez Santiago of Puerto Rico had a topsy-turvy game in the Albin Countergambit against IM Jordi Fluvia Poyatos of Andorra, which, after many adventures, he won:

Upsets (Teams)

Tajikistan (vs. Portugal), Tunisia (vs. Costa Rica), Afghanistan (vs. Dominican Republic), Myanmar (vs. Isle of Man), Fiji (vs. Palau), and Lesotho (vs. Mauritania) scored upset wins, while Canada (vs. Turkiye), Bangladesh (vs. Hungary B), Ecuador (vs. Belgium), South Korea (vs. Estonia), Barbados (vs. El Salvador), Eswatini (vs. Ethiopia), Dominica (vs. Chad), and Cambodia (vs. Democratic Republic of the Congo) scored upset draws.

South Korea has been featured twice already in the Upsets section of these Olympiad articles: first and second appearance; here, it's making its third appearance. The South Korean players are definitely underrated! Eswatini's (1758 average rating) draw against Ethiopia (2064.25) is a superb result, as is Ecuador's (2208.75) draw against Belgium (2477.5). However, the most impressive result has to be Afghanistan's (2038) 4-0 win against Dominican Republic (2217.5).

Hameedullah Haidary's win against IM Josue Araujo Sanchez was rather aesthetically pleasing:

Brilliant Games

GM Alisher Suleymenov, who famously defeated GM Magnus Carlsen with sacrifice after sacrifice, is simply a tactical genius:

GM Santiago Avila Pavas of Colombia also played a sharp and beautiful game against FM Domingos Junior of Angola, though Junior did have a (somewhat hard to find / appreciate!) save on move 32:

Round 7 Pairings

India vs. China will prove to be a very important match for the standings, but there's also a very intriguing storyline in this matchup: will world champion GM Ding Liren be able to bounce back from his recent rating drop against none other than his challenger, GM Gukesh Dommaraju? It will also be curious to see if Lithuania and Vietnam can keep up their dark horse form, while defending champion Uzebkistan will have a tough task ahead against Ukraine.

Leaderboard (Women's)

Overview (Women's)

Team India continues its stellar form as it now leads both the Open and Women's, which means it's also winning the Gaprindashvili Cup prize, which is awarded to the team that scores the best in both the open and women's sections. In fact, India is far ahead of its closest rivals for the Gaprindashvili Cup prize, Georgia and Armenia, which have a combined rank in both the Open and Women's of 13 to India's 2. India went through Armenia without too many issues, though the 2.5-1.5 score made the match seem closer than it actually was. Georgia, which has conceded one draw so far, won against Mongolia, while China, which lost yesterday, lost again today against Poland — Poland has the same score as Georgia now and is only one match point behind India.

You can find more results here.

The Top Teams

India's small margin of victory against Armenia could have been much larger. GM Vaishali Rameshbabu played a very solid game against WIM Mariam Mkrtchyan, but GM Harika Dronavalli had a better endgame against IM Lilit Mkrtchian, while IM Tania Sachdev was significantly better in her own endgame clash against IM Anna M. Sargsyan. Unfortunately for team India, said endgames were not easy to convert, so the day's hero was IM Divya Deshmukh, who showed good preparation against GM Elina Danielian's French and hunted her king in brutal fashion:

IM Tania Sachdev in contemplation
Photo: Michal Walusza / FIDE

Georgia's victory over Mongolia was an even more quiet affair as the top three boards saw little deviation away from equality. It was IM Salome Melia who cemented Georgia's win, but not before she was technically lost for the length of a seven-move interval against WFM Erdenebayar Khuslen:

Poland was looking strong against China as IM Alina Kashlinskaya was better or slightly better against GM Zhu Jiner and so too was GM Monika Socko against IM Yuxin Song. The day's winner, though, was IM Oliwia Kiolbasa, who applied positional pressure against IM Guo Qi's isolated pawn. The positional squeeze suddenly turned tactical, though, as Kiolbasa used her bishop pair to attack Guo's king.

The USA defeated Switzerland as Germany and Spain won against Italy and Argentina, respectively. In addition, a highly tactical game occurred on the fixed board 2 of the host country, where WIM Zsoka Gaal played an attacking melee against IM Deysi Cori T.:

The Biggest Upsets (Games)

Tian Yi Liu of Hong Kong, China defended very well against Antonina Gora of Ireland:

Upsets (Teams)

Australia (vs. Israel), Malaysia (vs. Croatia), Turkmenistan (vs. Brazil), Tajikistan (vs. Finland) , Sri Lanka (vs. Egypt), United Arab Emirates (vs. Ecuador), Dominican Republic (vs. Hungary C), South Africa (vs. Denmark), Kyrgyzstan (vs. North Macedonia), Lebanon (vs. Japan), Lesotho (vs. Puerto Rico), and Maldives (vs. Bermuda) scored upset wins, while Austria (vs. Bulgaria), Uzbekistan (vs. Netherlands), Slovenia (vs. Turkiye), Slovakia (vs. Romania), Portugal (vs. Sweden), and Haiti (vs. Zambia) scored upset draws.

In particular, Malaysia's (1977.5 average rating) win against Croatia (2157.25) was a significant rating upset.

Brilliant Games

WFM Jessica Molina of Bolivia played an unconventional Rubinstein trap, along with many other sacrifices, to defeat WFM Bernadette Galas of the Philippines:

Round 7 Pairings

The 1st and 2nd seeds of the tournament, India and Georgia, will face off in a much anticipated match. Poland's match against Ukraine will also be very important for the standings.

Olympiad Tactics

The Turkish chess trainer and FM Nazmi Can Doğan alias @NaSil is taking tactical snippets from the Olympiad:

Interview

Director of operations at Lichess, Theo Wait, caught up with Lichess streamer IM Laura Unuk as they discussed her win against WGM Jennifer Perez Rodriguez of Paraguay, her preparation for that game, and her experience at chess Olympiads.

Olympiad Miscellany

IM Faustino Oro, the youngest IM in the world, is observing the Olympiad as a spectator to learn how to prepare for future Olympiads.
Photo: Michal Walusza / FIDE