Chennai Grand Masters: Top ranked Erigaisi to face Gujrathi in opening round

Chennai: World No. 4 Indian chess grandmaster and top seed Arjun Erigaisi will open his Chennai Grand Masters campaign against compatriot , starting here on Tuesday.

Erigaisi will play for the first time in India after crossing the historic 2800 ELO ranking mark when he takes the board.

The eight-player strong classical event will see Aravindh Chithambaram take on Iranian Amin Tabatabaei, Vachier-Lagrave Maxime will face Maghsoodloo Parham and American Grandmaster Levon Aronian will play Alexey Sarana in the opening round.

The second edition of the seven round competition will also feature a Challengers event featuring female players for the first time. Organised by MGD1 with ChessBase India, and sponsored by the Sports Development Authority of Tamil Nadu, the tournament will be held at the 1,100-seat Anna Centenary Library.

The event will also feature two Indian women -- Harika Dronavalli and Vaishali Rameshbabu.

The Challengers participants, will fight for a prize pool of Rs 20 lakh, with the winner taking home Rs six lakh and a direct berth in the Masters next year.

In the Challenger category, Vaishali will take on Mendonca Leon Luke while Harika will play Pranav V.

In the other two matches, Raunak Sadhwani will face off against Karthikeyan Murali while Pranesh M will play Abhimanyu Puranik.

The Challengers event, which is introduced for this year, will give Indian prodigies the chance to compete in top-level tournaments.

D Gukesh had won the inaugural edition last year but will miss this year's competition as he is preparing for the world championships title against Ding Liren of China.