2 Viet GMs gain world chess slots

Vietnamese grandmasters Nguyen Anh Dung and Dao Thien Hai gained the two berths to the World Championships yesterday at the close of the Asian Zone 3.2a eliminations.

Nguyen played Filipino GM Bong Villamayor to a 57-move draw to top the tournament with seven points on five wins and four draws. Dao Thien Hai finished tied with Indonesian GM Utut Adianto for second but won in the tiebreak to take the second berth.

With the draw, Nguyen topped the tournament and earned $700 while dropping Villamayor into a tie for third with IM Jayson Gonzales on 5.5 points.

Dao and Adianto finished with 6.5 points each, and played a 25-minute active chess to break the tie. They leveled the score, 1-1, in the first tiebreaker, but Dao won the second tiebreaker, a five-minute blitz, 1.5-0.5.

Dao could have made it an all Vietnamese entry in the world championships right after the final round with a win over IM Denny Juswanto of Indonesia but was forced to the draw after 47 moves of the Nimzo-Indian Defense. — Joey Villar