VietNamNet Bridge – Tran Minh Thang fulfilled Viet Nam’s target at the World Youth Chess Championship (WYCC) when he took a gold medal at the Open U-8 category yesterday in Vung Tau City.

Kings: Vietnamese chess player Tran Minh Thang (left) bagged the U-8 category gold medal at the World Youth Chess Championship in Vung Tau City yesterday. Meanwhile Ivan Saric took the gold medal in the U-18 class.

As the host of the annual tournament for the first time, Viet Nam set a goal of winning at least one gold medal, but wasn’t expecting youth master Thang to do it over the favoured veterans.

In the final round yesterday, Thang had no difficulty beating Jonah Lee from Canada. After 11 rounds of the Swiss-style tournament, Thang pocketed 10 points for gold medal. His only loss was in the fifth round to Alireza Olamaei from Iran.

He was only one of three masters of any age group to have earned such a high number of points. The two others were Zhansaya Abdumalik of Kazakhstan, champion of the girls’ U-8, and Rout Padmini from India, winner of the girls’ U-14 categories.

Host Viet Nam took silver in the Open U-18 class thanks to Grand Master Nguyen Ngoc Truong Son, who had sat on the top of the tournament until the penultimate round on Wednesday.

Son was a favourite, as he dominated the class from the beginning with his outstanding performance through 10 rounds where he took six wins, three draws and one loss.

In the last round yesterday, Son was seeded No 3 at the competition and was unexpectedly drawn by Jacek Tomczak from Poland.

At the same time, his rival Ivan Saric who had the same 7.5 points as Son, secured 0.5 points after a draw game against Ter-Sahakyan Samvel from Armenia.

His teammate Le Quang Liem sparked hope for a medal for Viet Nam on Wednesday when he joined the leading group after ten rounds. Unfortunately, the hope vanished yesterday, as he lost to Samuel Shankland of the US.

The tournament’s second seed Liem dropped from fourth place to sixth.

Women’s Grand Master Valentina Golubenko of Croatia was already the girls’ U-18 champion after round 10, with nine points and two points clear of all contenders. Her defeat yesterday did not affect her standings.

The Indian masters set up their domination in three classes of Open U-16 by master B Adhiban who pocketed nine points. His team-mate Gujrathi Vidit Santosh triumphed in the Open U-14 with the same result. Sayantan Das pocketed 9.5 points to conquer the Open U-12.

In other pools, Zhai Mo of China earned 8.5 points to take the girls’ U-12 title. Poland’s Jan-Krzysztof Duda won the Open U-10 with 9.5 points, while Aleksandra Goriachkina of Russia won in the girls’ U-10 with nine points. Finally, Nazi Paikidze from Croatia took gold in the girls’ U-16.

The WYCC drew the participation of more than 1,500 masters from 120 countries and territories.

The WYCC is a traditional large tournament for young high level competitors from all continents of the world. The tournament is held every year and it is the second time the competition was organised in an Asian country. The first time was in Singapore.

It is part of the official competition system under the World Chess League and is the foundation of bestowing reference points and Elo points on young competitors world-wide.

(Source: Viet Nam News)