Team Herald
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PANJIM: Goa’s Evan Telles created history winning the 38th National U-7 Open Chess Championship 2025 (event code 419629/OD/2025) at the KT Global School, Barunei Temple Road, Khordha, Odisha, on Thursday. In an exceptional display of raw talent, the 7-year-old and 2nd year student of Manovikas School, Margao, made short work of top seed Thumati Sreyansh in the eighth round beating Vaibhav Vishnu of Bihar to win the gold outright with 8.5 points out of 9 rounds.
He is now selected to represent India at the World U-7 later this year. He is the son of Dr Jean Telles and hails from Salcete Taluka Chess Association.
The President of Goa Chess Association Mahesh Candolkar hailed the victory.
Secretary of Goa Chess Association Ashesh Keni said that Evan is a chess prodigy and will rise to the highest levels. He said that he expected him to win the title looking at his games at the U-7 State Championship played recently and said that inspite of tough competition Goa has managed to win the gold medal after winning the silver last year ahead of other chess playing States namely Tamil Nadu and Maharastra.
He congratulated the coach Prakash Singh and his team of Chess Guru Academy and the parents of Evan Telles for supporting him. Other members of Goa Chess Association Executive Committee and Salcete Taluka Chess Association expressed their happiness over the victory.
In the U-7 girls’ category, Aradhya Desai was placed 16th in the National Girls.
A K Verma, CEO of All India Chess Federation (AICF) presented the prize in the presence of Dharmendra Kumar, Treasurer AICF; Sagarika Nath IPS, SP of Khorda District; Debratta Bhatta, secretary, Orissa State Chess Association.