Cerdas leads Bali chess tournament

Cerdas leads Bali chess tournament

JAKARTA (JP): IM Cerdas Barus has taken the lead in the Bali Jeff-RCA Grandmaster Chess Tournament with 9.0 Victory Points (VP).

Cerdas, who scored 8.0 VP Tuesday to share the lead with Filipino GM Rogelio Antonio, now leads in his own right after beating IM Danny Juswanto on Wednesday.

Antonio added only 0.5 VP after drawing with IM Ruben Gunawan and is in second place with 8.5 VP..

The match between Cerdas and Danny, both members of the Indonesian Olympic chess team that played in Yerevan, Armenia, in 1996, was tense as Cerdas continued to attack Danny, checkmating him in the 48th move of the Catalan opening.

Danny admired Cerdas's performance and said he had a good defense.

"Cerdas managed to defend himself from my attacks and I could not penetrate," he said.

With Wednesday's win, Cerdas has to score only 2.0 VP to win the GM Norm title. It would be his first.

"With four more rounds to go, I have to at least win once and draw twice. I know it will be a difficult job for me since I have to face four strong players," Cerdas said.

Meanwhile, GM Edhi Handoko was lucky to get away with a draw against Vietnam's IM Tu Hoang Thong, who made several blunders allowing Edhi to force a draw.

"Hong Tong actually had four pawns and should have won the game. But he made a mistake by making the same three moves and referee Djauhari ordered the game to a draw," Edhi said.

Other results: NM Hamdani Rudin vs IM Salor Sitanggang 1/2- 1/2, NM Firdaus Maksum vs NM Kifly Tunasli 1-0, IM Bobby Kurniawan vs NM Tommy Supriyanto 1-0, IM Nelson Mariano (Philippines) vs GM Ardiansyah 0-1, FM Irwanto vs IM Nasib Ginting 1/2-1/2.

Rankings: Cerdas 9.0 VP, Antonio 8.5 VP, Ruben 8.0 VP, Edhi 7.0 VP, Danny, Hamdani and Ardiansyah 6.5 VP, Mariano 6.0 VP, Hoang Thong 5.5 VP, Bobby 4.5 VP, Nasib 4.0 VP, Salor 3.5 VP, Irwanto 3.0 VP, Maksum 2.5 VP, Tommy 1.5 VP and Kifly 1.0 VP. (lnt)