Indonesian men's team ties 2-2 with Canada

JAKARTA (JP): The Indonesian men's chess team had another tie 2-2 with the Canadians in the fifth round of the 34th Chess Olympics at Istanbul Convention and Exhibition Center in Istanbul on Wednesday.

Indonesian senior men's chess player Edhi Handoko made his first turn against Alexandre Lesiege which ended in a draw in the 48th move.

But Indonesian Ruben Gunawan gave up to Kevin Spraggette, a former candidate for world champion, after playing 58 moves in the second board.

In the third board, Danny Juswanto took revenge by forcing Igor Zugic to give up in the 51th move.

Cerdas Barus failed to end the match with a victory and he agreed to tie with Pascal Charbonneau in the 56th move.

With the result, Indonesia has so far collected 11.5 Victory Points (VPs). The score put Indonesia in the 41st position.

Germany still leads in the overall standings with 16.5 VPs, followed by Russia with 15.5 VPs and Slovakia with 15 VPs.

Non-playing captain Sebastian Simanjuntak said that the men's team should be able to win over Canada.

"But a draw result is O.K., because we didn't field Utut Adianto," said Sebastian, who is also Utut's second.

Utut will lead the team against Finland on Thursday. He will play Olli Salmensuu in the first board while Danny will meet Mika Karttunen, Cerdas to challenge Heikki Kalio and Hamdani Rubin to take on Mikael Nouro.

The Chess Olympiad will end in Nov. 12.

In the same event, the Indonesian women's team outclassed Malaysian team 2.0-1.0 on Wednesday.

Al Zakiah earned one point by defeating Nie Lim Jean, while Yenny Riayaningrum and Evi Lindiawati contributed 0.5 points after they drew with Samantha Lee and Eliza Ibrahim respectively.

The women's team is now in the 49th position with 7.5 VPs.

The team is fielding Upi D. Tamin, Ai and Yenny during their encounter on Thursday with Turkmenistan. (ivy)