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Humpy wins second game to force tie-breaker June 02, 2004 11:03 IST Grandmaster Koneru Humpy, who suffered a shock defeat in the first game of the World Chess Championship semifinal, bounced back superbly beating Woman Grandmaster Ekaterina Kovalevskaya of Russia in the second game to push the match into tie-breaker here today. The tiebreaker will be played later tonight under rapid chess rules. In the other semifinal, Grandmaster Antoaneta Stefanova of Bulgaria advanced to the final ousting former World Women Champion Maia Chiburdanidze of Georgia. Maya also went out in the semifinal stage in the last World Championship in 2001 against eventual champion Zhu Chen of China. After squandering a winning chance in the first game, the Indian was back to her basics and played the do-or-die second game with absolute concentration. She was also assisted by lady luck, according to experts. It was a Bogo-Indian defence that gave Humpy, playing white, a tangible advantage and slowly she started exerting pressure on the queenside after trading the queens in the early opening. Though the queen-less middle game offered sufficient counter play to Kovlevskaya, Humpy was instrumental in forcing the Russian to part with a pawn. Thereafter, Kovalevskaya played quite well and had enough compensation for the lost material. But with the clock ticking away she committed a positional blunder on the 27th move that spelt her doom. The wily Indian soon coordinated her pieces and easily won a second pawn that was part of the erroneous package offered by Kovaevskaya. Soon it was curtains for the Russian after further simplification took place. The game lasted 51 moves. After levelling the scores at 1-1, Humpy looked absolutely relaxed and went to her room to prepare for the tie-breaker. The Bulgarian Stefanova has had some resounding success in this event so far and she now awaits the winner of the Humpy vs Kovalevskaya match after a rest day on Wednesday. The Bulgarian gave an emphatic display to beat Chiburdanidze, who did not handle her white pieces well enough. It was an irregular opening choice by the Georgian that surprised even Grandmaster Vlimir Georgiev, Stefaova's second here. Chiburdanidze was on the receiving end immediately after the opening phase and found her pieces stranded on the wrong squares resulting in the loss of a pawn. Playing in copy-book fashion Stefanova did well to keep Maia's forces in check on the king side. At the same time she continued with her demolition act on the other flank that netted her two more pawns. To hasten the end, Stefanova sacrificed her rook for a Bishop and this allowed her pawns to create havoc. Chiburdandze's efforts to pull off the near impossible went in vain and she was forced to resign after battling for 55 moves. Results: Semifinal Game 2 Koneru Humpy (Ind) beat Ekaterina Kovalevskaya (Rus) 1-1, goes to tiebreak; The moves -- Game 2 Maia Chiburdanidze v/s Antoaneta Stefanova
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