Indian Grandmaster R Praggnanandhaa beat Alexey Sarana of Serbia to register his third straight victory and take his tally to a commendable 8.5 points after the end of the 12th and penultimate round of Tata Steel Masters here on Saturday.
On a day when D Gukesh looked poised to retain his sole lead on nine points as he was close to winning against Dutchman Jorden van Foreest, Arjun Erigaisi ended the hopes of Nodirbek Abdusattorov of Uzbekistan by scoring a fine victory with white pieces.
If Gukesh wins, he will move to nine points and will stay ahead of Praggnanandhaa while Abdusattorov slipped to third spot on 7.5 points.
Praggnanandhaa was involved in another Queen's gambit declined opening. Only this time, he was playing with white pieces.
It was quite a contrast from his previous round game against Caruana as Sarana went for an early advance of king side pawns and then castled on the queen side. It was time to launch an attack against the black king and Praggnanandhaa did not