With each passing round, the race for the title is getting intense. After the seventh round of the Asian Junior chess championship, five players — Parimarjan Negi, Vishnu Prasanna, Ashwin Jayram, P Karthikeyan and Shyan Sundar — were ahead of the 52-player pack with 5.5 points each.

In the biggest upset of the day, Shyam Sundar shocked Deep Sengupta in a ding-dong battle and IM S P Sethuraman was upset by Saravana Krishnan. With just two rounds remaining, the five players will have to increase their scoring rate to be in contention for the title.

In the girls’ section, Mary Ann Gomes, after six successive victories, was held to a draw by Kiran Manisha Mohanty. The Kolkota-based teenager played another tough game and did sight victory. It appeared that the title would be decided on Wednesday itself but some accurate play by Kiran Manisha and some hesitancy by Mary to go for the kill resulted in a draw.

The 13-year-old Padmini Rout continued to impress as she scored a sparkling positional victory over P Sivasankari. Padmini is in sole second spot with 5.5 points, trailing Mary by a point. The nightmare continued for top seed Atousa Pourkashiyan as she lost to P Uthara, rated a good 250 points below here. Atousa has scored just three points.

Negi, after a shocking loss early in the tournament, is back in contention. It came as a surprise when he went for a safe solid line against Vishnu Prasanna in a Sicilian Classical game. The game was rather dull with neither showing much ambition in gunning for victory. After 34 moves, they called it a day with a draw.

But it was a battle till the end for supremacy on the second board in another Sicilian game between Jayram and Karthikeyan. Ashwin showed plenty of pluck in sacrificing a pawn for initiative. But under time pressure, it was a series of misses by both. Karthikeyan did have the upper hand after winning another pawn but Ashwin's bishop kept things under check and he won a pawn back. After 45 moves, the players agreed to split the point.

Mary, sticking with the French Defence, gained advantage and looked set for a victory in the middle game. The transposition to the ending where Kiran Manisha had a queen, rook, two knights as against her opponent's queen, bishop, knight and two rooks, hinted at a victory for Mary. But she got into severe time trouble and after the 30th move, the players agreed to split the point.

Results (Round 7):

Open: Parimarjan Negi (5.5) drew Vishnu Prasanna (5.5); Ashwin Jayram (5.5) drew P Karthikeyan (5.5); Shyam Sundar (5.5) bt Deep Sengupta (4.5); S P Sethuraman (4) lt to Saravana Krishnan (5); Swapnil Dhopade (4.5) drew B Adhiban (4.5); Lalith Babu (4.5) drew T Purushothaman (4.5): S Nitin (4) drew Abhishek Das (4); Akshat Khamparia (4.5) bt Meghan Gupte (3.5); Aditay Udeshi (4.5) bt Sahaj Grover (3.5); Javad Alavi (4) bt Abhishek Kelkar (3).

Girls: Kiran Manisha Mohanty (5) drew Mary Ann Gomes (6.5); Padmini Rout (5.5) bt P Sivasankari (4); Soumya Swaminathan (4) drew P Priya (4); Pon Kruthika (4) bt S Harini (3.5); Atousa Pourkashiyan (3) lt to P Uthara (4); Shamima Liza Akter (4) bt Sriharika Y G (2.5); Bhakti J (1.5) lt to Krutika Nadig (3.5); Sonakshi Rathore (0.5) lt to Mitali Patil (3).