THE Philippines’ Sander Severino and Jasper Rom overpowered their respective rivals to remain unbeaten and at the helm after three rounds of the online World Chess Championship for People with Disabilities Sunday.
Severino and Rom won both their games with the black pieces with the former smashing Moroccan Jamal Messala in 45 moves and the latter blasting American Griffin McConnell in 60 moves both via a French Defense.
The pair of triumphs kept the multiple ASEAN and Asian Para Games gold medalists in an 18-player lead group with pristine three points in this nine-round tournament that drew 249 participants from 40 countries.
Another Filipino Rodolfo Sarmiento, in contrast, lost his place on top after succumbing to Argentinian Leonel Amato in 41 moves of a Queen’s Pawn London System and fell to a big group at 39th place with two points.
It included two other Philippine bets Henry Lopez and Darry Bernardo.
Lopez split the point with Polish Szymon Kasperczyk in 36 moves of a Slav Defense while Bernardo bounced back from a second-round defeat by dismantling Malaysian Ardian Syah Muming’s Caro-kann Defense in 27 moves. — JV