Title - Ratnakaran stuns Shyam

K. Ratnakaran, Southern Railway’s second-seeded IM from Kerala, defeated Tamil Nadu’s top-seeded P. Shyam Nikhil in the eighth round of the first ACE International FIDE-rated chess tournament at the Town Hall here on Thursday.Later, LIC’s K. Dinesh Sharma moved into lone lead with 8 points from nine rounds with Ratnakaran close behind him with 7.5.

The results (ninth round): K. Dinesh Sharma (LIC, 8) bt O.T. Anilkumar (Ker, 6.5), S. Nitin (TN, 6.5) drew with K. Ratnakaran (S. Rly, 7.5), D.P. Singh (S. Rly, 7) bt Himanshu Sharma (SWR, 7), S.R. Harikrishna (Ker, 6.5) drew with N. Surendran (Bloom CA, 6.5), N. Lokesh (Bloom CA, 6.5) drew with S. Anand Raj (Bloom CA, 6.5), M. Chakravarthi Reddy (AP, 6.5) drew with M.A. Joy Lazar (Ker, 6.5), G.S. Sreejith (Ker, 6) drew with Arjun Satheesh (Ker, 6.5), P. Shyam Nikhil (TN, 6.5) bt K.K. Mohanan (Ker, 5.5), M. Kunal (TN, 6.5) bt M.B. Senbabu (Ker, 5.5), Siva Mahadevan (TN, 6.5) bt Ramesh Shanmugasundaram (TN, 5.5). — Special Correspondent