City’s Vedika is U-10 girls Western Asia champion

Nagpur: Vedika Pal lived up to her billing with an unbeaten performance and emerged as the U-10 girls champion in Western Asian Youth Chess Championship which concluded at Kyrgyzstan.With an Elo of 1456, Vedika started as the top seed and gave a performance rating of 1643 to clinch the nine-round tournament collecting 8.5 points. She won the championship with a round remaining and earned as many as 54.8 rating points. A total of 19 players qualified from six countries were vying for the honours, where Vedika posted victories in eight rounds and drew the fifth board against third seed Adelina Ramisova of Kyrgyzstan. While Vedika won the trophy in style, her compatriots Aadya Ranganath and Aadya Gowda claimed the second and third position respectively as three Indian youngsters completed a rare podium finish.Vedika started her campaign with a win over silver and bronze medalist Aadya Gowda and Aadya Ranganath respectively. In the third round, the city girl defended well with her black pieces to score full points against Kyrgyzstan’s fourth seeded Zhibek Sagynbekova.In the fourth round, Vedika utilized her opening advantage well to get the better of Aliya Zhumambayeva from Kazakhstan and took lead with full four points before playing out a fifth-round draw.Despite being held by the third seed, Vedika continued her attacking play and outplayed Kyrgyzstan’s Ayana Toktaalieva before getting the better of Kazakhstan’s Zhansaya Zhankarayeva and Aruzhan Toktarbayeva to emerge champion with a round remaining. Despite winning the tournament with a round to go, Vedika completed the event with a fluent win over Smirnova Oksana Andr in the final round.