Sasikiran to spearhead Indian challenge in Asian Continental chess

Subic Bay (Philippines): Grandmaster Krishnan Sasikiran will spearhead the Indian challenge in the

ninth edition of the Asian Continental chess championship starting here. Sasikiran is seeded second while P Harikrishna starts as the fifth seed and these two are front runners for five qualifying berths for the next World Cup to be held in 2011. The nine round championship will be played under FIDE`s Swiss rules with a total cash prize of USD 50,000. In case of a tie for the qualifying spots, play-off games will be played for the first time in any Asian event to determine the qualifiers. A total of 90 participants from 14 countries will compete in the open section of the event. The top seeded player of the event is high-flying Vietnamese Le Quang Liem who has been at the top of his game after a double victory at Moscow early this year. Chinese Ni Hua and Li Chao are amongst the other contenders for the championship. The local challenge will be led by Wesley So who was the pick amongst the Asians in the last World Cup at Khanty Mansiysk in November last year. The young gun had successfully eliminated Gata Kamsky of United States and Vassily Ivanchuk of Ukraine which certainly makes him a sure fire bet for the top five. Sasikiran hit remarkable form recently guiding the Indian team to a podium finish in the world team championship. The Indian will like to continue in the same rhythm and looks in fine fettle. Former world junior champion Abhijeet Gupta, G N Gopal, S Kidambi and Tejas Bakre are the other Indian Grandmasters in the fray who would like to make their presence felt while International Master D Harika has opted to play in the open section and will have a chance to get a Grandmaster norm. Padmini Rout has also taken the similar bold step. National Champion B Adhiban and S P Sethuraman complete the Indian line up here. In the women`s championship being organised simultaneously, Arjuna Awardee Tania Sachdev starts as the best Indian hope as the third seed but the fact that there is only one qualifying berth for the women`s World Cup next year makes her task quite difficult. Chinese Ju Wenjun is the top seed in this section with an excellent ELO rating of 2500 points. The other Indians in the fray are S Meenakshi and Kiran Manisha Mohanty. PTI