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National A blind Round 8-10: It's a race to the finish between Kishan Gangolli and Subhendu Patra

by Manjunatha Murthy - 12/01/2019

Kishan Gangolli has been the five-time national champion of India in the visually challenged section. He has been known to dominate the national tournaments since quite some years now. However, in 2019 he isn't able to get the desired lead as Subhendu Patra from Odisha is right on his heels matching blow for blow. In their personal encounter which took place in the ninth round Kishan managed to win his game against Subhendu. However Patra came back strongly in the tenth round when he beat Swapnil Shah while Kishan had to draw his game against Marimuthu in an inferior position. As things stand we have two leaders Kishan Gangolli and Subhendu Patra with 8.0/10 and three rounds to go. Report of rounds 8 to 10 by chief arbiter Manjunatha Murthy.

Round 8

Bo.No.RtgNameResultNameRtgNo.
1141673Patil Shirish0 - 1Kavlekar Sanjay R.181211
2121557Waghmare Sachin Lahu0 - 1Swapanil Shah163410
3131819Soundarya Kumar Pradhan½ - ½Kishan Gangolli20089
411686Patra Subhendu Kumar1 - 0Shashidhar K M15228
521563Marimuthu K+ - -Hariharan Gandhi14487
631747Makwana Ashvin K1 - 0Prachurya Kumar Pradhan16346
741697Krishna Udupa1 - 0Aryan B Joshi18635

Soundarya Kumar Pradhan played with white pieces against Kishan Gangolli. It was the Nimzo Indian Rubinstein variation. Soundarya defended staunchly. Kishan had his chances but did not take them. The game finally ended in a draw.

Subhendu Kumar Patra managed to beat Shashidhar KM when the latter blundered a pawn in time pressure in the endgame.


One of the biggest upsets of the round was veteran Krishna Udupa beating Aryan Joshi. The well-known player from Shimoga sacrificed his queen and checkmated his opponent in style.

White to play and finish off the game!

Due to bad health condition Hariharan Gandhi was absent for 8th and 9th round.

Round 9

Bo.No.RtgNameResultNameRtgNo.
151863Aryan B Joshi½ - ½Patil Shirish167314
261634Prachurya Kumar Pradhan½ - ½Krishna Udupa16974
371448Hariharan Gandhi- - +Makwana Ashvin K17473
481522Shashidhar K M0 - 1Marimuthu K15632
592008Kishan Gangolli1 - 0Patra Subhendu Kumar16861
6101634Swapanil Shah½ - ½Soundarya Kumar Pradhan181913
7111812Kavlekar Sanjay R.0 - 1Waghmare Sachin Lahu155712

The big game of round 9 and the entire tournament was Kishan Gangolli versus Subhendu Kumar Patra

Subhendu played quite well to maintain the balance. But at some point, he miscalculated and Kishan managed to win the game by pushing his pawn to e7. With this win Kishan took the sole lead from Subhendu, but the Odisha lad was not going to five up easily.

Round 10

Bo.No.RtgNameResultNameRtgNo.
1141673Patil Shirish1 - 0Waghmare Sachin Lahu155712
2131819Soundarya Kumar Pradhan1 - 0Kavlekar Sanjay R.181211
311686Patra Subhendu Kumar1 - 0Swapanil Shah163410
421563Marimuthu K½ - ½Kishan Gangolli20089
531747Makwana Ashvin K1 - 0Shashidhar K M15228
641697Krishna Udupa+ - -Hariharan Gandhi14487
751863Aryan B Joshi1 - 0Prachurya Kumar Pradhan16346

In a game full of excitement Marimuthu had clear edge against Kishan Gangolli. The game was played in French Tarrasch variation and witnessed Marimuthu having advantage and a dominating position. The pressure of playing against the reigning National champion got the better of him and he accepted Kishan’s offer in a jiffy.

After being half point behind the leader Subhendu Patra managed to catch Kishan Gangolli as he beat Swapnil Shah from the white side of Ruy Lopez

Rankings after round 10

Rk.SNoNameFEDRtgClub/CityPts. TB1  TB2  TB3 
19Kishan GangolliIND2008Kar8,01,033,756
21Patra Subhendu KumarIND1686Odisha8,00,038,507
32Marimuthu KIND1563T N7,00,536,006
45Aryan B JoshiIND1863Mah7,00,530,256
53Makwana Ashvin KIND1747Guj6,51,030,755
64Krishna UdupaIND1697Kar6,50,031,505
76Prachurya Kumar PradhanIND1634Odisha5,00,023,253
813Soundarya Kumar PradhanIND1819Odisha4,51,518,253
98Shashidhar K MIND1522Kar4,51,013,004
1010Swapanil ShahIND1634Mah4,50,513,253
1111Kavlekar Sanjay R.IND1812Goa3,01,09,752
1214Patil ShirishIND1673Mah3,00,014,251
1312Waghmare Sachin LahuIND1557Mah2,50,08,502
147Hariharan GandhiIND1448T N0,00,00,000

This is going to be a fight until the finish! In case of the same score Kishan will become the national champion for the 6th occasion because he has a better tiebreak as compared to Subhendu owing to the fact that Kishan beat Subhendu in their individual encounter. But Kishan has three strong opponents in the last three rounds - Ashvin Makwana, Krishna Udupa and Aryan Joshi, while Subhendu will face relatively easy opposition in the form of Sanjay Kavlekar and Sachin Waghmare. In the last round Subhendu is up against the World Junior silver medalist Soundarya Kumar Pradhan. 

About the author:

Murthy Manjunatha is the chief arbiter at the National Premier 2019. He has been an arbiter at blind tournaments since many years and conducts the proceedings with great speed and accuracy and a human touch!


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