Indian men faced yet another reverse in their medal quest when they succumbed to a 1.5-2.5 against third seeds Israel in the 12th round of the 36th Chess Olympiad at Mallorca.
The Indian team, which had trounced Canada 3.5-0.5 in the earlier round to keep alive their hope of finishing on the podium, failed to impress against Israel as three of the four members opted for quick draws while P Harikrishna went down to Boris Avrukh.
Viswanathan Anand drew quickly with Boris Gelfand on board one and Krishnan Sasikrian and Surya Shekhar Ganguly followed suit with Emil Sutovsky and Michael Roiz.
Ukraine made another stride forward towards what would be their maiden Olympiad triumph and defeated Poland 2.5-1.5.
For the winners, Sergey Karjakin -- the youngest ever Grandmaster -- and Pavel Eljanov came good with crushing victories, Vassily Ivanchuk got an easy draw and Andrei Volokitin's lost an inconsequential match.
With their 9th victory in the event, Ukraine moved to 34.5 points and stretched its lead to 3.5 points over Russia and Armenia. Of the two, the former suffered a shock 1.5-2.5 defeat at the hands of Georgia while the latter drew with United States.
Israel took the sole fourth spot after beating the Indians with 30.5 points while Cuba scored a miraculous 4-0 victory over Slovenia to move to fifth spot. United States is the next team in line on 29.5 while the Indian men were pushed to joint 7th spot along with Georgia.
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