Fresh from his success at the Carlos Torre memorial tournament where he finished second, Grandmaster P Harikrishna will take on top seed Hungarian Zoltan Almasi in the first round of the Golden Jubilee edition of Reggio Emilia Chess tournament here.

Harikrishna is only the second Indian to be invited for a super tournament here precisely 16 years after Viswanathan Anand made history by winning the event ahead of favourite Russians Gary Kasparov and Anatoly Karpov.

For the record, this year’s edition is not as strong as the 1992 edition when most of the top players participated. Almasi heads the 10-player-all-Grandmaster affair.

Russia’s Konstantin Landa is the other player higher rated than Harikrishna in this nine-round event which is being held under all-play-all rules. Harikrishna, who is looking forward to crossing the 2700 mark in the rating list, gets a perfect platform here to improve his rating further. The Indian starts with 2668 ELO points and already has nine points in the bag from the Carlos Torre memorial at Mexico.

However, as Harikrishna put it, it will not be easy pickings.

“All the players here are strong Grandmasters who have tasted success at various levels. I think form is always a crucial factor in strong tournaments,” he said.

In the draw of lots, Harikrishna drew number 8 which implies he will get five blacks and four games with white pieces. In the first round, the Indian locks horns with rating favourite Almasi, whom he had beaten last year at the Marx Gyorgy memorial tournament at Paks in Hungary.

The local challenge is spearheaded by Michael Godena, who meets Russian Vugar Gashimov in the first round.
Players: Zoltan Almasi (Hun, 2651), Konstantin Landa (Rus, 2678), P Harikrishna (Ind, 2668), Vugar Gashimov (Aze, 2663), David Navara (Cze, 2656), Sergei Tiviakov (Ned, 2643), Ni Hua (Chn, 2641), Victor Korchnoi (Swi, 2611), Mihail Marin (Rou, 2551) and Michele Godena (Ita, 2535).