SIO Round 5 Update

8.23PM As usual, activity erupts here in the playing hall as players return to check on the next round's pairings. Various people are analysing the remnants of Antic - Samar. Not much to report now folks. Will have to wait til tomorrow's action, and hopefully our fancy widget will work then. For the time being, good night and thank you for joining me.

8.21PM Resigned! Grandmaster Dejan Antic has resigned. The untitled Raul Samar is victorious!!

8.14PM UNBELIEVABLE turn of events here ladies and gents!! Grandmaster Dejan Antic is once again in another draw claim situation. He is claiming 3x rep. The arbiters, Shaun Press and Charles Zworestine, just now went over the moves and the claim has been DENIED! This was the position (remember, Antic is white):

White: Ke2, Rg8
Black: Kg2, Ra3, g3

As a result of the incorrect claim, Samar gets an extra 3 minutes (to his 5), while Antic remains to less than a minute.

7.56PM Antic - Samar now to R+K for Antic and R+K+2P for Samar. And it looks like Antic may have just missed a simple draw!!

7.53PM Antic - Samar getting tense. Folks now crowding around both players. Samar needs to be careful. FM Smirnov was just here to tell me that the Serbian may have tricked the Pinoy-Aussie.

7.49PM Arbiter Shaun Press is glad that he's received two apologies, from two different persons, in the space of 24 hours. Seems to be the season for apologising to him, he reckons.

7.47PM ELO firepower gathered around two boards here as Johansen, Mas, Ganguly and Zhao analyse their respective games. They are joined by Rogers and several others.

7.41PM Smith just resigned.

7.38PM Two games only left on the stage: Antic - Samar and Malakhatko - Smith. Antic has only K+N+R, while Samar has K+B+R+2P. Antic is in big trouble! While Smith, being a pawn down in N endgame is also in trouble.

7.31PM Mas - Johansen was a draw. Good result for the Malaysian. And just now, Antonio has defeated his young adversary.

7.26PM Antonio now a pawn up in a R endgame against Swiercz. Antonio's a-pawn is flying up the board, but the problem is, his own R is in front of it, while Swiercz's is behind it.

7.23PM Here's an important lesson. As soon as you finish your game, sit down and enter the moves into your database. Then spend a little time analysing. That's what Akobian is doing right now. He's sitting across from me analysing his round 5 encounter.

7.21PM Akobian walks into where I'm seating and the first thing he says is, "Crazy game". He just played Pinoy junior JJ De Ramos. The American won that one. Chow - Solomon was a draw.

7.16PM Kiwi FM Smith is putting up a great fight against Malakhatko in a N endgame.

7.14PM Endgame galore on the stage. Malaysian Mas in N endgame against Johansen. The Aussie is a pawn up. CORRECTION: B+N endgame.

7.09PM Round 5 is a great day for our Pinoy contigent, AWOL members notwithstanding. Four Pinoys were on the stage today including a couple of their juniors. Just went up on stage a couple of minutes ago and it looks like Samar is holding well against Antic. Samar has B+R+2P while the Serbian GM holds N+R+2P. Against the IM-elect Swiercz, GM Antonio is the exchange down.

7.06PM Make sure that you guys refresh the blog page at least every 3-5 minutes. Apologies for this primitive approach.

7.04PM Lane prevailed over Milligan, and so did Wallis (playing black) against Davis. And at this moment, Max Illingworth walked into the officials' room to report that he's lost. Di consoles by saying that the IM is a strong one, anyway.

6.59PM Young Singaporean FM Daniel Fernandez is a piece down against Igor Goldenberg. On 12 Newsouthwelshaman McNamara is giving GM-hopeful Puchen Wang a pretty good workout in yet another endgame, this time so far both guys have the rook pairs each.

6.54PM Illingworth, with white , is now in the endgame against Reprintsev. It's B+R+K+2P for Illingworth and K+Q+3P for the international master. Lane - Milligan entered the rook endgame some time ago with Lane having 2 pawns up.

6.49PM More results. What we're doing is a little primitive. But this will do for now. Another NZ young up-and-comer, Bobby Cheng, has lost to Trevor Hay.

Ayvazyan - Daylo, 0-1
Pecori - Dragicevic, 1-0
Fuatai - Krezovic, 0-1
Rej - Broekhuyse, 1-0

6.44PM NSWCA boss Bill Gletsos is here. Talking to Shaun Press at the moment. Probably about some nuance in a such-and-such a rule. Bill came over earlier to briefly talk about ratings. I offered him a chance to have a final say on the ratings debate via a "Q&A", but he declined. He seems quite convinced that those who've already made up their minds will never agree to his view.

Chandler - Manon-og, 1-0
Perena - Jones, 0-1
Haessler - Bitansky, 0-1
Schon - Zozulia, 0-1
Cunanan - Steadman, 0-1