Indian Grandmasters P Harikrishna and V Pranav made it to the last 32 stage of the World Chess Cup after eliminating Daniel Dardha of Belgium and Titas Stremavicius of Lithuania respectively by an identical 1.5-0.5 score at the end of the second game of the second round here on Saturday.
Having shown some sublime form thus far, Harikrishna was the first Indian to make the cut as Dardha achieved nothing with his white pieces and the first game loss against the Indian proved decisive.
It was a similar story for Pranav as he too had to hold with black pieces after winning the first game with white. As it happened, Stremavicius tried hard to break through the defenses but a calm Pranav forced the game to a draw in the ensuing rook and pawns endgame.
However, Diptayan Ghosh went out of contention after he lost his way against Armenian Gabriel Sargissian. After getting an easy draw with white pieces in the first game, Diptayan, who had ousted Ian Nepomniachtchi of Russia in the previous round, just could not find his rhythm in the second game and lost 0.5-1.5.
Higher ranked Indians Arjun Erigaisi and R Praggnanandhaa also made it to the last 32 stage after defeating Shamsiddin Vokhidov of Uzbekistan and Robert Hovhannisyan of Armenia respectively.
A draw was enough for Arjun to take him to the next round while Praggnanandhaa played a fine game to win as he had drawn the opener.
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