Sasha Mongeli takes sole lead at Zone 4.4 Zonal Chess Championships
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Reading Time: 2min | Sat. 08.02.25. | 16:48
Mongeli remained in contention to collect the Ksh65,000 top prize after beating Zuri Kaloki and drawing with Julie Mutisya and remains the top lady
Equity Bank and reigning Kenya woman champion and FIDE master WFM Sasha Mongeli took the sole lead in the Africa Zone 4.4 Individual Chess Championship at Clarion Hotel.
Organised by Chess Kenya Federation and African Chess Confederation, the event entered its second day with three federations: Kenya, Somali and South Sudan represented.
Mongeli remained in contention to collect the Ksh65,000 top prize after beating Zuri Kaloki and drawing with Julie Mutisya and remains the top lady.
Joyce Nyaruai who won the event in Madagascar last year, beat South Sudanese Mabior Ding and is placed third in the ladies category with two points.
Julie Mutisya is currently lying second on 2.5 points.
This round also produced two shock results with reigning Somali champion Abdulkadir Warsame (Elo 1979) flooring his Kenya counterpart and hot favourite KCB Chess Club’s CM Robert Mc’ligeyo (Elo 2027) with the white pieces after a complex middlegame full of tactics.
Warsame remains at the top of the rank with 3.5 points and remains on course to claim his first-ever zonal title.
Equity Bank teammates Lenny Mataiga and Olympian woman candidate master WCM Jully Mutisya (Elo 1815) met and it ended spectacularly after the latter unleashed forced combinations leading to either forced checkmate or pawn promotion for Jully and Mataiga surrendered.
The third round had no surprises with Kenya men's champion Robert Mc’ligeyo (Elo 2027) of KCB Chess Club remaining in third position on the log with three points after beating Lenny Mataiga.
The tournament will resume on Monday with round six taking place.
Africa has five zones namely Zones 4.1, 4.2, 4.3, 4.4 and 4.5 of which only two are World Cup qualifiers i.e. Zone 4.1 and 4.5 which yield a total of three players each, men and women, to play in the World Cup that will consist of 206 players from all continents.
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