Hainan Danzhou Masters: India's Vidit Gujrathi holds tournament leader Bu Xiangzhi on day of draws

Wednesday at the Hainan Danzhou Masters was the day that comes at least once in almost every strong event — a day of dull draws. After about four hours of play, all games of the round had finished peacefully.

For the Indian No 3, Vidit Gujrathi, the round posed a big test. He had the white pieces against Bu Xiangzhi, the lowest rated player in the tournament. However, Bu has also been leading the tournament since the last two rounds and given that Vidit was in the bottom-most spot, it would have been desirable for him to win the round. This would have not only pushed Vidit up the leaderboard but also prevented Bu from scoring any points. Alas, that was not to be.

Bu tried a line of the Open Catalan that he had already drawn with against Wang Yue at the Chinese Chess Team Championship in Hangzhou in June, this year. Back then, the game had finished in just 26 moves, but this time Bu had something else prepared.

Bu deviated from his previous game after 13 moves but this also did not lead to anything substantial as queens were traded a couple of moves later and Bu remained with an isolated queen’s pawn in the ensuing endgame.

As play progressed, Bu sought counter-play against Vidit’s far advanced queenside pawns and soon liquidated into an equal rook endgame. After shuffling pieces for a few more moves, the players decided to call it a day.

Another Chinese grandmaster Yu Yangyi, after winning two back to back games in the last two rounds, slowed down his pace in the antepenultimate round with a draw against Jan Krzysztof Duda. This game was also a fifty mover which led to an equal endgame almost immediately out of the opening.

Initially, Yangyi’s queenside looked slightly weak due to the split pawns but by the time the players had reached the first time control, it was Duda who seemed to be on the back foot.

On his 42nd turn, Yangyi came up with a series of exchanges after which Black’s queen-bishop pawn looked quite threatening. But Duda had it all covered. He simply ignored the advancing pawn and played a bishop manoeuvre that gave him strong counterplay. Once Duda had accomplished the manoeuvre, his opponent could neither have exchanged that bishop nor could he leave it be. Yangyi, therefore, went for a repetition straight away and retained his second spot on the leaderboard.

In the game between Wei Yi and Le Quang Liem, the young Chinese grandmaster got an edge in a Queen’s Indian Defence middle game after Le allowed his opponent to shatter his kingside pawns with a trade on f6.

Wei grabbed the opportunity to take over the initiative but wasn’t able to find the most accurate follow up. He tried to push for an edge in the resulting endgame but after the rooks were exchanged, Le was able to inflict some weaknesses in his opponent’s kingside pawn structure.

Wei kept the damage to a minimum and tried to generate some initiative against the black monarch in the second time control. However, there was just too less material remaining over the board. After a series of checks, the knights went off the board and then the queens. The resulting king and pawn endgame was an easy draw.

Vladimir Fedoseev finished with his fifth straight draw of the tournament against GM Sam Shankland. The two discussed a Catalan which remained equal all the way through. Exchanging several pieces throughout the opening and the middle game, Fedoseev managed to pocket a pawn by the time the first time control was reached. With the rooks on the board, however, the prospects of this extra pawn weren’t really promising. After trying for another 37 moves, he decided to sign peace on move 77.

Five rounds into the event, Bu still leads the tournament by a half-point margin. Yangyi remains in second place with a score of 3.0/5. Sam, Duda and Fedoseev share third place with a score of 2.5/5 while Vidit, Wei and Le are a further half point behind sharing the bottom-most spot. With just two more rounds to go, Vidit remains 1.5 points behind the leader. In the final two rounds, Vidit will have to score as much as he can to improve his rank on the leaderboard.

Standings