Mardin (Turkey): Led by Koneru Humpy, the Indian women's team cruised to an emphatic 3.5-0.5 victory over Turkey and jumped to fourth spot after the end of the second round of the World Women Team Chess Championship here.
Kubra Ozturk denied India a complete whitewash against the hosts by holding International Master Tania Sachdev to an easy draw, while on the other three boards the Indian girls had no problems in ensuring sweeping victories.
China came back strongly from a near-shocking start to beat South Africa 4-0, while Russia recorded a 3-1 victory against Ukraine.
China and Russia now share the lead with Georgian eves, who scored a minimal 2.5-1.5 victory over Armenia.
With seven rounds still to go in the 10-team round-robin event, China, Russia and Georgia have four match points, while India now stands fourth on three match points.
Not far behind are Armenia and Vietnam with two points in their kitty, while Ukraine is now seventh with just one point that it secured against India in the opener.
Turkey, Greece and South Africa share the last spot, yet to open their match point account.
South Africa, in fact, are yet to open their score on any boards.
The Turks had started with a very satisfying 1.5 points against highly fancied China in the opener but Humpy ended chances of a similar performance with clinical precision against Yildiz Betul Cemre.
For the records, it was a queen pawn game wherein Humpy exerted pressure on the queen side to get two connected passed pawns. After regulation exchanges, the players reached an endgame which turned out to be child's play for the Indian ace.
Before Humpy's triumph, Padmini Rout and Soumya Swaminathan had ensured Indian victories over Kardelen Cemhan and Ebru Kaplan, respectively.
Tania Sachdev could do little against Kubra Ozturk in a Queen's Indian defence game as black on a day when the think-tank decided to give Harika a rest on the second board.
Harika flew in directly after a hectic event in China and still played the first game against Ukraine that ended in a 2-2 draw.
Ukraine could not continue with the same promise that they showed in round one and lost to Russia. The victories for the winning team came on board two and four where Tatiana Kosintseva and Gunina Valentina proved superior with white pieces while the other two games were drawn.
Georgian top board Nana Dzagnidze provided a much needed clincher for the team scoring over Elina Danielian of Armenia on the top board. The other three boards were drawn keeping the Georgians atop the tables.
After a 0-4 whitewash in the opener, Greece lost narrowly to Vietnam while South Africans were no match for wily Chinese girls.
Results - Round 2:
India (3) beat Turkey (0) 3.5-0.5; Ukraine (1) lost to Russia (4) 1-3; China (4) beat South Africa (0) 4-0; Georgia (4) beat Armenia (2) 2.5-1.5; Greece (0) lost to Vietnam (2) 1.5-2.5.
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