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Philippines Team 1 absorbed a 3-1 loss to Russia’s Team 1 to bid farewell to their semi-final at the end of the seven-round preliminaries of 1.S t FIDE Online Chess Olympiad for people with disabilities Friday.
FIDE master Sander Severino, Henry López and Darry Bernardo loaned FM Stanislav Babarykin, international master Andrei Obodchuk and Alexey Smirnov on boards one through three that sealed the Filipinos’ doom.
Cheyzer Crystal Mendoza was the only bright spot of the round with an impressive win over female FM Svetlana Gerasimova on the fourth board that avoided a shutout.
With the loss, PH Team 1 ended in a five-team tie for fifth place with 10 match points, but finished eighth overall after the tiebreaker.
Team 1 from Russia topped the preliminaries with 13 points, followed by Team 3 from Ukraine (12 points), Team 1 from Poland (11) and Team 2 from Russia (11).
Meanwhile, PH Team 2 finished ninth overall despite knocking down 11th choose Croatia 2.5-1.5.
Felix Aguilera and Cheryl Angot delivered the wins on the bottom boards for the Filipinos, while Arman Subaste completed the win by halving the point with Domagoj Glazar on board two.
Menandro Redor was the only casualty after a setback with FM Bogdan Bozinovic in the top table.
Despite the heartbreak, it was still respectable for the country’s two teams as they emerged as the best in Asia.
“Even though we did not reach the semi-finals, we proved that we are the best Asian team, especially in my team, where we had no title players,” said Subaste, a former ASEAN and Asian Games gold medalist.
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