RP chessers trim Ecuador; ladies bow to Belarus

The young turks took the cudgels for the Philippines by pulling off three victories to make up for the sorry loss of GM Eugene Torre on the top board as RP posted a 3-1 win over Ecuador to gain a share of 30th place at resumption of the World Chess Olympiad in Turin, Italy Saturday.

Wesley So, 12, outwitted IM Plinio Pazos after 60 moves of a Modern Defense to cap the Filipinos’ victory after fellow FM Oliver Dimakiling and Darwin Laylo bested IM Palau Mieles and Miguel Medina, respectively.

But the Filipinos, seeded 35th in a field of 146, failed to score an expected sweep over their 59th ranked rivals as Torre lost to fellow GM Franco Matamoros.

The win shoved RP to joint 30th with 15.5 points in the company of Iceland, Germany, Croatia, England, Norway, Peru, Colombia, Switzerland and Malaysia.

The Philippines next faces 27th-seed Iceland, which lost to 45th-ranked Indonesia, 1.5-2.5.

Armenia surged ahead with 18 points after a 2.5-1.5 win over Uzbekistan and will test the mettle of the Netherlands in the seventh round Sunday.

The Dutch shocked the top-seeded Russians, 2.5-1.5, on a victory by Friso Nijboer over fellow GM Sergey Rublevskiy on board 4 as they took solo second with 17.5 points. Russia slid to third with 17 in a tie with Belarus, which clobbered Spain, 3-1.

The Filipina chessers bowed to Belarus with Sherily Cua saving the team from a shutout loss by halving the point with WIM Anna Sharevich.

The loss dropped the RP ladies to 50th place with 9 points in a tie with nine others, including seventh round opponent Finland.

Russia kept its lead in women’s play with a 2-1 victory over Hungary for 14.5 points. Ukraine edged Spain, 2-1, to hike its output to 14 points.