Sixth seed and leader of Indian hopes Grandmaster Parimarjan Negi along with Slovenian Grandmaster Lenic Luka and Ukrainian Grandmaster Mikhailo Oleksienko share the lead with six and half points after the seventh round matches of the ongoing 9th Parsvnath International Open Grandmasters Chess Tournament here at Ludlow Castle on Wednesday.

Playing with black pieces in Scheveningen variation of Sicilian Defence, overnight sole leader Negi held top seed Alexander Areshchenko of Ukraine while Lenic and Oleksienko joined Negi at the top of point table after defeating Indian Grandmasters S Arun Prasad and Abhijeet Gupta respectively in the seventh round encounters.

On the top board, Areshchenko had an advantageous position in the middle game with two connected passed pawns in the centre but failed miserably to convert the advantage to decisive result and signed peace treaty in 77 moves. Meanwhile playing white side of Chigorin Defence, city based International Master Vaibhav Suri held fourth seed Austrian Grandmaster Markus Ragger to a creditable draw.

In other seventh round matches, Yuriy Kuzubov defeated International Master Sahaj Grover while International Masters Saptarshi Roy and Shyam Nikil held Grandmaster Konstantin Chernyshov of Russia and Alon Greenfeld of Israel respectively. In a surprising result, International Master Vikaramadiya Kamble shocked Grandmaster Neelotpal Das.