School kids top men’s and women’s tables after 1st half

National Chess Championships

Ranindu Liyanage of Ananda College and Nethmi Fernando of Girls High School, Kandy topped the tables at the end of the first half of the National Chess Championships held at the Sri Lanka Chess Federation Headquarters, Colombo. The tournaments are held according to a round-robin system with 14 players each battling out in the men’s and women’s category to be crowned as National Chess Champion. Amidst the prevailing health situation, the Chess Federation has successfully been able to conduct the topmost tournament in the Sri Lankan Chess Calendar. Chess Federation of Sri Lanka is offering Rs. 320,000.00 in cash and other attractive prizes for the winners. The champion will receive Rs. 100,000.00.

The men’s section ended the week with the top three seeded players finishing on the top of the tables but as history suggests the second half of the tournament is likely to bring a few surprises. The tournament started on Friday with the top two seeded players Susal de Silva (Nalanda College) and Ranindu Dilshan Liyanage facing off against the two veteran Sri Lankan players IM Romesh Weerawardane (Fischer CC) and FM Anuruddha Chinthaka (Kandy YMCA) where the two youngsters came on top scoring wins to kick start their battle for the title. Ranindu then stormed to take the lead after the fifth round victory over Maheesha Dabarera (Maliyadeva College) whilst Susal and FM Minul Doluweera (Royal College) conceded defeats. At the end of the 1st week, Ranindu was leading the pack with six points. Minul (5 points) and Susal (4.5 points) were behind him.

There were a few interesting mid-table performances as well, notably from the new attacking player from Jaffna S. Sivathanujan (Grand Prix Chess Club) who went on to upset a few experienced players by scoring strong wins. He is tied at 6th place with Maheesha Dabarera, Theekshana Denuwan (Ananda College) and Rasika Samaranayaka (University of Peradeniya) whilst the veterans Anuruddha and Romesh were in the fourth and fifth positions respectively.

In the women’s section Nethmi Fernando stormed to a massive lead by the end of the week. She has already played against the next two players chasing her for the title as well as the reigning National Champion. It was simply a dominant performance where only Ehsha Pallie (Visakha Vidyalaya) could hold her to a draw in the opening week. Ashvini Pavalachandran (Wycherley International) who was leading the chase was 1.5 points behind Nethmi whilst two Visakians Ehsha Pallie and WFM Nevanjee Hewawasam were two points behind.

Defending Champion Sayuni Gihansa Jayaweera (Dharmasoka College) had a slow start to the tournament and was sitting in the bottom half of the table whilst former National women’s Champion, WIM Sachini Ranasinghe (NF3 CC) also had a slow start to the tournament. Ranasinghe later caught up the pace and was in the fifth place and yet may pose a serious threat to the title contenders with a strong second half.

The rest of the pack sharing the fifth place include Hashara Abeysinghe (NSBM), Tharushi Sandeepani (Devi Balika Vidyalaya) and Tharushi Niklesha (Visakha Vidyalaya).

The next set of games will be conducted from 19th (Saturday) to 21st.