RI takes third place at World Youth Chess Olympiad
Musthofid, The Jakarta Post, Kuala Lumpur
The Indonesian junior chess team capped its first participation in the World Youth U-16 Chess Olympiad with a remarkable achievement, finishing in third place at the eight-day tournament, which ended on Tuesday.
Indonesia crushed Iran 3.5-0.5 in the final of the ten-round competition to amass an overall 26.5 points, half a point behind runner-up and top seed Ukraine, which pounded Malaysia B 4-0 on the day.
China, which had already been assured of its title after the penultimate round, stamped its domination with a 3-1 win over England to build its collection to a formidable 31 points.
Susanto Megaranto, Taufik Halay and Surya Wahyudi all beat their respective opponents while Tirta Chandra Purnama was the only player to score a draw.
The Indonesian players and officials were overjoyed, with team manager GM Utut Adianto hailing it as the crowning moment of a hard and tiring battle.
"We have won the battle nicely. It was very hard because we came to the tournament with no substitutes. They played an uninterrupted ten rounds of competition," Utut said.
Coming into the playing hall on Tuesday, Indonesia had resigned itself to a finish in fourth place given the pairings in the final rounds.
India should have easily strolled over Australia A, and would have stayed in second place it took almost from the start. In fact, it was only able to win 2.5-1.5 points, with Indian players Deepan Chakkravarthy and Deep Sengupta.
Against Iran, Indonesia, as Utut had said, would have been happy to scrape a draw.
"It's incredible that we won with a big point margin," Utut said.
Susanto beat Syed Arash Akbarinia in 37 moves in a Sicilian game. Surya was involved in an English game for 37 moves before stopping Omid Norudzi and Taufik continued his rising run with a win over Hamoon Tahmasbi in 39 moves in a Dutch game.
Tirta was held to a draw by Amin Nasri, both playing 56 moves in a King's Indian game.
Although they were clearly shy to express their feelings it was apparent that the players could not contain their happiness. They happily posed for photographers with their trophy.
Praise also came from some of the teams, Indonesian Ambassador to Malaysia Hadi A. Wayarabi Alhadar and Ignatius Leong, the president of the ASEAN Chess Confederation.
"After two years of the foundation of the confederation, the effort has borne fruit. Let's congratulate Indonesia on coming in third in this Olympiad," Leong said in his speech during the closing ceremony.
"We should learn chess from Indonesia next," said an official of the Malaysian team complimenting their neighboring team's triumph.
Judging by individual performances on each board, Susanto finished as the second best player behind FIDE Master (FM) Wang Yue of China on board one. He registered 7.5 points from ten rounds, compared to Wang's 8.5 points.
The tournament, which featured 28 teams from 20 countries, was officially closed by Ong Tee Kiat, Malaysian deputy minister of youth and sports affairs.
The Indonesian team, led by captain Hendry Djamals, will arrive in Jakarta on Thursday to join a reception ceremony arranged by the Indonesian Chess Association (Percasi).