Riga: Indian Grandmaster K Sasikiran was beaten by Alireza Firouzja of France in round 8 of the Open event to drop to third spot in the FIDE Grand Swiss tournament here.
Firouzja registered victory in 43 moves with white pieces against the Indian Grandmaster on the first board Thursday night. He climbed up to 6.5 points to bag the sole lead by a full point.
A group of 10 players, featuring top seed and world No.2 Fabiano Caruana and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, are in joint second spot.
Sasikiran remained on five points to be placed in the third spot with a bunch of players, including fellow Indians Nihal Sarin and P Harikrishna.
Sarin shared a point with Iran's Maghsoodloo Parham while Harikrishna drew with Russia's Evgeniy Najer in the eighth round.
S P Sethuraman was the only Indian to record a victory in this round in the Open section as he defeated Netherlands's Lucas Van Foreest to take his score to three points.
Teen sensations R Praggnanandhaa and D Gukesh experienced mixed fortunes with the former drawing his contest against Nodirbek Abdusattorov while the latter got defeated at the hands of Nodirbek Yakhubov.
In the women's competition, the highest rated Indian D Harika drew against Russia's Olga Bedelka and fell behind in the race to qualify for the Candidates Tournament next year. She has five points to her name after eight rounds and is among a bunch of players in joint fourth.
Among the other Indian women, R Vaishali and Padmini Rout claimed victories over Russia's Alina Bivol and Spain's Maria Eizaguerri Floris in the eighth round. Divya Deshmukh suffered loss against Valentina Gunina and Vantika Agrawal drew highly experienced Pia Cramling.
Lei Tingjie of China is a point clear of the field with seven points while IM Elisabeth Paehtz from Germany is a surprise second with six points, followed by a couple of Russians Alexandra Kosteniuk and Natalija Pogonina on 5.5.
Ten Indian men and five women participated in the tournament.
The Grand Swiss tournament and Women's Grand Swiss 2021 are part of the qualifications for the 2021-23 World Championship cycle. The top two finishers here will qualify for the Candidates Tournament in 2022.
With PTI Inputs
