Utut out for higher elo rating after Kallai win

JAKARTA (JP): Indonesian Grand Master (GM) Utut Adianto sought to lift his elo rating yesterday after scoring a win in the penultimate round of the Biel Masters chess tournament in Switzerland on Thursday.

Utut beat Hungarian GM Gabor Kallai after 32 moves and needed half a point more in his last match against International Master Dejan Pikula of Croatia late yesterday to improve his current rating of 2,610 by five.

Another victory would double the increase, giving Utut a career high elo rating of 2,620.

Chess observer Kristianus Liem said yesterday that Utut's Thursday success protected him from a possible drop to his rating. A defeat to Pikula, whose rating is 2,470, would mean a zero growth for Utut.

"I believe Utut is out to seal the tournament with a win, not just a draw," said Kristianus, who is also the spokesman for the Indonesian Chess Association.

Badly needing a win to open his bid of retaining his Biel title, Utut, the 1994 winner and runner-up last year, confounded Kallai with a Meraner opening variant on Thursday.

Kallai quickly found himself under mounting pressure from Utut, who played white. A nervous Kallai blundered in the 15th move, allowing Utut to dominate the rest of the game, which lasted three hours and 40 minutes.

"I chose the Meraner variant because I knew Kallai was not familiar with it," Utut said afterward.

The Indonesian has now collected 7.5 points, still half a point behind leader Milos Pavlovic, who beat Swiss first seed Vadim Milov in another game Thursday.

Pikula was another point behind Utut after beating Hans Juerg Kaenel of Switzerland, enabling him to share sixth place with Vladimir Tukmakov of Ukraine and Tomas Polak of the Czech Republic.

Germany's Oliver Niklasch and Dejan Antic produced the biggest upsets of the day when they toppled Hungarian Lajos Portisch and Yugoslav Dragoljub Ciric, who are among the tournament's top seeds.

Other results Thursday included: IM Alexander Mikhailevsky-GM Zurab Sturua 0.5-0.5, Polak-GM Vladimir Tukmakov 0.5-0.5, GM Ivan Nemet-IM Alexander Cherniaev 0.5-0.5, and IM Abhijit Kunte-Yoav Lederer 0.5-0.5.

After the Biel Masters, Utut will fly to Kosalin in Poland to play in the Kosalin Open from Aug. 3 to Aug. 13. (lnt)