Name it the curse of being a world champion! Gukesh Dommaraju went winless in 9 qualifying spherical robin video games on the Weissenhaus leg of the Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour. Gukesh follows within the footsteps of his predecessor on the world champion’s throne, Ding Liren, who had additionally endured a winless occasion final yr at Weissenhaus, when the occasion was only a standalone freestyle occasion and the Chinese language grandmaster was nonetheless a world champion.
The 18-year-old world champion from Chennai, in reality, ended the speedy part of the occasion with a defeat to Magnus Carlsen. Regardless of enjoying out seven attracts (and being handed two defeats by Alireza Firouzja and Carlsen), Gukesh has certified for the quarter-finals after ending in eighth spot out of 10 contenders.
Gukesh’s opponent within the subsequent spherical for now stays unclear. A brand new rule launched on the occasion throughout the technical assembly was that the participant who ends on prime of the standings after the spherical robin part of the event, will get to select his opponent within the quarter-finals. This implies Firouzja, who was the table-topper, picks his quarter-final rival from between Hikaru Nakamura, Vincent Keymer, Nodirbek Abdusattarov and Gukesh. Then, second place finisher Javokhir Sindarov picks his quarters opponent from the three gamers left. Then Fabiano Caruana, who was no 3 in standings, picks his opponent. Whoever is left performs Carlsen within the quarters.
Gukesh, the youngest world champion in historical past, can draw solace from the truth that from now, video games can be performed in classical time controls which he prefers over the sooner codecs.
Carlsen took down Gukesh in 46 strikes, grabbing an awesome benefit within the span of two back-to-back strikes earlier than forcing a resignation.
On transfer 42, Gukesh moved his knight to d5 (42. Nd5??) attempting to get it out of hurt’s manner from Carlsen’s king. The engine confirmed that as an alternative, Gukehs ought to have protected the knight together with his rook (42. Rf2). On the subsequent transfer, Gukesh once more blundered in a deep time crunch — enjoying 43. h3?? As a substitute of 43.Ne7+.
These two strikes later, Gukesh was dropping in opposition to a person recognized for his finish sport grinding prowess.
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Carlsen himself has not checked out his finest on the primary day of the occasion in Weissenhaus, dropping three video games out of the 5. However on Saturday, he roared again into the occasion, successful three of his 4 remaining video games.
