Arjun Erigaisi rose to the world no 2 spot within the reside scores (that are up to date in actual time) on Thursday after beating Alexey Sarana in Spherical 3 on the Chennai Grand Masters event in Tamil Nadu’s capital.
Within the reside scores, Arjun Erigaisi now has 2805.8 score factors, which noticed him nudge forward of USA’s Fabiano Caruana (who has 2805.0) and American GM Hikaru Nakamura (2802.0). India’s Gukesh, who will compete in opposition to Ding Liren within the World Chess Championship later this month, is fifth within the reside rankings with 2783.0 factors.
Solely Magnus Carlsen is forward of Arjun in the meanwhile with 2831.0 factors within the scores.
Simply final month, Arjun Erigaisi had develop into the sixteenth participant to ever contact 2800 score factors. He couldn’t formally be a part of the 2800 membership that has 14 members as he had dropped beneath 2800 by the point the month-to-month score listing was printed by FIDE.
beforehand, he had additionally develop into the World no 3. However speaking to The Indian Categorical, Arjun had spoken about his emotions about milestones like World no 3 and 2800 score factors.
“They do really feel good. However they don’t matter that a lot. Final yr, if it occurred, I might be very blissful. And if I fell behind, for instance, I might be very unhappy. There can be a transparent change of feelings. That’s not the case. It feels good if it occurs. However even when it doesn’t occur, I’m nonetheless blissful,” Arjun Erigaisi had informed The Indian Categorical.
How Arjun Erigaisi beat Alexey Sarana
On Thursday in opposition to Sarana, Arjun opted for a St Petersburg Variation within the Nimzo-Indian Protection, Arjun Erigaisi took down Sarana with black items in 37 strikes. Sarana had managed to erode the line of defense of pawns in entrance of Arjun’s king whereas conserving his personal king ensconced behind three pawns. However on the twenty sixth transfer, the Serbian erred by pushing his pawn to h4, which precipitated his benefit on the eval bar to break down.
Ultimately Sarana crumpled when Arjun’s pawn on the d file began to achieve the endzone to earn a promotion.
For Arjun Erigaisi, that is his second win within the event after three rounds. Arjun had additionally introduced down compatriot and Chess Olympiad teammate Vidit Gujrathi within the first spherical after a marathon battle.
The 21-year-old Arjun thus bolstered his lead on the prime of the Masters class, which he collectively leads the sphere which has a score common of 2729 together with Amin Tabatabaei after three rounds.
Vidit, in the meantime, earned his first factors because of a draw in opposition to Indian GM Aravindh Chithambaram. In different matches, Amin Tabatabaei shocked Maxime Vachier-Lagrave whereas Levon Aronian claimed a robust victory over Parham Maghsoodloo.
