India ‘B’ team settled for a bronze medal in the Open section while the India ‘A’ women’s side also finished third in the 44th Chess Olympiad here on Tuesday.
India ‘B’ defeated Germany 3-1 in their final round match to end at third position.
Uzbekistan sprung a surprise by bagging the gold medal with a 2-1 win over the Netherlands ahead of a strong Armenian team, which beat Spain 2.5-1.5 in the final round, in the Open section.
The top-seeded India ‘A’ women’s team crashed to a defeat in the 11th and final round to USA to see it’s gold medal hopes evaporate. The Koneru Humpy-led team finished third. Grandmasters Gukesh D and Nihal Sarin won gold medals in board 1 and board 2, on the last day of Chess Olympiad.
Tania Sachdev and Rameshbabu Vaishali, who belong to India A team, under women’s section, won silver and bronze medals in board 4 and 3 respectively. Uzbekistan grabbed gold in the open section of the Chess Olympiad after defeating the Netherlands, ahead of Armenia and India 2. In the women’s tournament, India gave away the lead in the last hurdle with a loss against the United States. Gold thus went to Ukraine thanks to a final-round win over Poland.
At the closing ceremony, President, FIDE, Arkady Dvorkovich, said they were welcomed so much in Chennai and expressed his happiness and thankfulness for the hospitality. He hailed India the motherland of chess. Conveying the chess body’s deep gratitude to India -the Union and state governments- Stalin and all the people including vehicle drivers, he said: “We came here to Chennai as a united family, today we are even more united and even stronger”.