The Third Round. The First Victory of Koneru Humpy!
The third round started peacefully. The game of Anna Ushenina (playing white) and the tournament leader Antoaneta Stefanova ended with the draw already on the 14 move.
Xu Yuhua and Anna Muzychuk ended their game ust as soon. The peace was signed on the 18 move.
At the end of both games there were equal positions without any chance to win.
It seems as if girls considered today’s round as calm after a storm.
But it was not for everybody.
The longest was the game of Natalya Pogonina and Marie Sebag. Natalya made a rude mistake in the middle game let the opponent to successfully sacrifice quality and appeared in to quite a difficult position. In the mutual time trouble which lasted the final part of the game Marie began to make mistakes and lost the lion’s share of advantage. After it the Russian player could find the defensive positioning which led her to the long-awaited draw turning to 5 hour of the game.
Today Indian player with the highest rating Humpy Koneru gained her first victory. She managed to collect herself after two defeats and to beat Pia Cramling who plays also not so successfully in this tournament.
Tomorrow there will be a day-off in the “North Urals Cup” and it means we can expect more exciting struggle in the next round because players will come with renewed vigour.
Translation: Olesya Aleynikova
Anna Burtasova,
Press-attache of the “North Urals Cup 2008”
Anna_burtasova(at)hotmail.com
Sebag will win this tournament.