Of Selangor Open - Going into the Final Round

The fate seems to be sealed and a new Champion shall be crowned regardless what the result would be in the final Round 9 of the 39th edition of the Selangor Open 2012. With an unassailable lead of a perfect 8 points out of 8 rounds, even though he may loss his final round match, IM Nolte will be crowned as the Selangor Open Champion irregardless if Ian Udani - his closest rival who is one point adrift, won his last round game and managed to catch up with Nolte's at 8 points a piece. The only question remain is will Nolte manage to do a perfect outing, or will it be tarnished with a draw or worse, a loss in the final Round 9 game? This will have to wait another 6 hours or so.

With more than 80% of the game ended at the time of print, and with both the Philippines player are in command at the top of the pack - IM Nolte with 8 points followed by Ian Udani at 7 points, the only remaining player at 6 points is Sumant Subramaniam who has managed to outplay Saprin Sabri on Table 3. It is almost certain that Sumant will meet top seed and leader Nolte on Table 1 and the National Junior player would probably want to redeem himself for the loss he had suffered at the hands of Sean Ooi, or will he play it safe and accept (or offer) a draw to Nolte? Ian Udani at 7 points will probably meet one of the six 5 1/2 pointers trailing the leader board.

With one more round to go, the top three leaders are separated by a point each with Nolte at the top having 8 points, Udani with 7 points and surprisingly Sumant at 3rd place with 6 points. 

The coveted Royal Selangor Open Chess Tournament Challenge Trophy

Roshan and Nabil going through their games with Nabil's sister, Nabila playinst Yit Ho at the background. Zaiasron Yahaya (standing on the left) and Yit Ho's brother, Yit San (standing on the right) looks over.