RP bows to tough N’lands in chess

The Philippines failed to hurdle the biggest stumbling block to its dream Top 10 finish in the World Chess Olympiad, bowing to the Netherlands, 1-3, and virtually kissing its bid goodbye in the 11th round at the Olympic Village in Turin, Italy Friday.

GMs Mark Paragua and Eugene Torre succeeded to hold GMs Ivan Sokolov and Sergey Tiviakov to a draw on the top two boards, respectively, but GM Joey Antonio was stopped on his tracks by Loek Van Wely, who dealt the erstwhile top Filipino performer his first defeat in nine games.

Darwin Laylo proved no match to GM Friso Nijboer and lost.

The loss was so stinging that it brought down RP back to joint 35th place with 25 points with two days left in the 13-round Swiss system tournament.

That was seven points behind Armenia, which hiked its output to 32 points after beating Czech Republic, 3-1, to surge ahead by 3.5 points over China. The surprising Chinese remained in second with 28.5 points despite a 1.5-2.5 loss to France, which gained a share of second place with its victim.

The Filipino chessers stood two points adrift behind the 10th-running Germany and their Dutch tormentors and it would probably take more than a miracle for them to even get close to within range of their target.

In fact, RP’s penultimate round opponent would be Switzerland, the 29th-ranked all-GM team powered by veteran campaigner and former world title challenger GM Viktor Korchnoi.

But while Paragua and company fell with a thud, the RP ladies continued to hang tough and held 13th seed Lithuania to a 1.5-1.5 standoff in some kind of an upset for a team ranked 60th in the group.

Sherily Cua trounced Daiya Batyte while Catherine Perena forced a draw with IM Dagne Ciuksyte to make up for the loss of Sheerie Joy Lomibao to IM Viktorija Cmilyte on the top board.

The draw enabled the RP ladies to tie Estonia, Israel, Iran and Lithuania for 21st place with 19 points although their mettle would be tested by Estonia in the 12th round Saturday.

Ukraine swamped Bulgaria, 2.5-0.5, to lead the ladies side with 25.5 points while Russia rapped Georgia, 2-1, to be in second with 24.5 points. China had 23.5 points for third after blanking Greece, 3-0.