After Round 6 of the European Team Chess Championship 2025 in Batumi, Georgia, Ukraine and Poland hold the sole leads in the Open and Women’s sections, respectively.
Ukraine scored a narrow victory over France, thanks to GM Igor Kovalenko (UKR, 2669), who defeated GM Pierre Laurent-Paoli (FRA, 2570). GM Ruslan Ponomariov (UKR, 2633) had a promising opportunity to score a full point against GM Marc’Andria Maurizzi (FRA, 2624) but missed the key idea to transpose into a winning pawn endgame, and the game ended in a draw. The encounters on the second and fourth boards were solid and also concluded in draws. With this result, Ukraine preserved its sole lead in the tournament with 11/12 match points.
The Netherlands emerged victorious against Serbia, posting a convincing 3–1 win to stay within striking distance of the leaders. GM Anish Giri (NED, 2759) defeated GM Alexandr Predke (SRB, 2634), while GM Jorden Van Foreest (NED, 2697) outplayed GM Alexey Sarana (SRB, 2661). The games on the remaining two boards were drawn.
The Netherlands trails Ukraine by just one team point, while Azerbaijan, which defeated Armenia 2.5–1.5, now sits in third place.
In the Women’s Championship, Poland extended their lead to three match points after a commanding 3–1 victory over Georgia.
IM Alina Kashlinskaya (POL, 2450) beat GM Nana Dzagnidze (GEO, 2496), and IM Aleksandra Maltsevskaya (POL, 2394) prevailed over GM Nino Batsiashvili (GEO, 2469), while the other two games were drawn.
Poland leads with a perfect score of 12/12, followed by Germany, Ukraine, and Romania, each with 9 match points.
October 11 is a free day, and Round 7 will start on October 12 at 15:00 local time.
All results, rankings and pairings can be found HERE.
Live video broadcast of the games with commentaries by GM Alojzije Jankovic and WGM Keti Tsatsalashvili can be found on the ECU TV platform or ECU YouTube channel.
Text and photos: European Chess Union
Official website: etcc2025.com/