KATHMANDU: Former Nepal champion Naveen Tandukar won both the Wednesday’s two round matches to take the lead at the first Rambir Shrestha Memorial FIDE Rating National Chess Tournament.

Naveen accumulated five points after he defeated Dinesh Shrestha in the fourth round and eased past another veteran Ganesh Man Duwal — winner of the recently held Makhan Rating Chess Tournament — in the fifth. Nepal champion Badri Lal Nepali, Sajan Pandey, Uttam Raj Thapa, Raju Subedi, Prem Krishna Maharjan, Rijendra Raj Bhandari, Dharam Bahadur Lama and Rabindra Shakya jointly share the second spot with four points.

While winning two rounds on Wednesday, Badri sneaked past Nepal’s first FIDE Master Manish Hamal in the fourth round and outplayed veteran Sita Ram Agrawal in the fifth. Uttam tasted double delight as he overcame Sajin Maharjan and Ratna Byanjankar while Raju disappointed veteran duo Rajendra Prasad Shrestha and Shyam Sundar Shrestha.

Rijendra defeated Umesh Sainju and Dinesh Shrestha while Dharam drew his fourth round tie with Rabindra before overpowering Prachanda Man Malakar. Rabindra saw off Niraj Niraula to earn four point after the fifth round. Sajan, meanwhile, shared points with Ratna Byanjankar and Sujendra Shrestha.

Sujendra, Manish, Bijaya J Shrestha and Lava Kumar Shrestha were joint third with 3.5 points while Rajendra, Shyam, Prachanda Man, Sajin, Dinesh, Babu Raja Maharjan, Hari Chandra Chaulagain, Krishna Prajapati, Shiromani Bajracharya, Ilias Ali, Hari Subba and Prajwal Rajopadhyaya have three points apiece.