Bengaluru:
Two twenty-year olds – R Praggnanandhaa and Javokhir Sindarov brought the fireworks and spectacle that lit up the first day of the three-week Candidates tournament with sparkling wins. The competition that will pick 19-year-old reigning world champion Gukesh’s opponent for the match, fittingly saw his peers step up and show intent as early as day 1.
India’s lone torchbearer in the Open field, Praggnanandhaa (playing with white pieces), whose form had been shaky heading in, was swivelling in his chair with contentment within the first five moves. His opponent, Dutchman Anish Giri, wore a smirk and then sat hunched over the board, falling behind on the clock by half an hour, presumably surprised by his opponent’s opening choice.
The Indian, who spent the moments before his Round 1 game in a meditative state – eyes closed, elbows resting on the table, had trotted out the Grand Prix Attack – an aggressive choice with the idea of mounting a kingside attack. The Indian advanced his f-pawn (3.f4) early, seizing space and considering the amount of time Giri spent weighing his options, he presumably was navigating through uncomfortable terrain. In an interesting choice of moves, the Indian sacrificed a pawn and improved his Queen. (10.f5 11.Qe1)
Playing his third Candidates, Giri tried to steady matters somewhat in the middlegame, managing to take the sting out of the attack on his King. Deciding not to exchange his rooks didn’t do Giri any favours, and soon he found himself in a position where he was forced to spot a series Only Moves while Praggnanandhaa stayed precise and slowly turned the screws.
The Indian succeeded in getting Giri to burn through his clock – he was down to roughly 13 minutes with nine moves to go until time control, a pawn down and in a minefield position. In the Open section, there are no time increments per move until move 40.
The engines seemed happy with the Indian’s position in a sharp endgame, offering him a no-brainer plus. Calculating complicated lines in the endgame is up the Indian’s alley and he made no mistake spotting the blows, like 34.h4, tightening the noose around his opponent. They made time control with Praggnanandhaa in a close to winning position and Giri hoping for a miracle. The latter wasn’t to be.
On the eve of his Round 1 game, Praggnanandhaa seemed tired of the references to him being among the ‘youngest’ players in the competition. “I feel old for chess, honestly. I’ve been playing for a long time already. So I don’t think this ‘young’ term is for me anymore,” he laughed. “There were a lot of learnings from last year and I feel good coming into this tournament. I’ve trained for this tournament and I feel confident.” It’s huge props to Praggnanandhaa’s preparation and mental resilience, coming off a tough couple of months to be able to outplay Giri and start with a win rightaway. At no point was he in any danger through the game.
The other 20-year old, 2025 World Cup winner Uzbeki in red-hot form – Sindarov, was worse through most part of his game against Andrey Esipenko. After a crazy time scramble, Sindarov came off with a winning position and could scarcely believe the turnaround of his fortunes in the game.
In the battle between the rating favourite Americans Fabiano Caruana and Hikaru Nakamura, Caruana (playing with white pieces) won in 83 moves.
The Candidates is the kind of tournament where favourites, predictions and punts can all end up in the woodchipper. The first round of the three-week competition can sometimes be about players feeling their way into the tournament. It’s still early days.
Mattias Bluebaum – the first German to make the Candidates in three decades, drew against Wei Yi and now seems to be in on the joke of him sweeping the tournament. “I think I already ruined the Great Bluebaum Sweep (something of an X joke on Bluebaum winning the Candidates without dropping a point),” Bluebaum told Chess.com, cracking up, “Now the only sweep I can do is 14 draws instead of 14 wins.”
In the Women’s Candidates, all four games were drawn. Vaishali R would be relieved to have survived by the skin of her teeth from a difficult position and massive time pressure against Uzbekistan’s Bibisara Assaubayeva, to take half a point. The other Indian in the field, World Cup winner Divya Deshmukh, let her last-minute entrant opponent, Anna Muzychuk (Koneru Humpy’s replacement), who was worse, off the hook and had to be content with a draw.
World No. 2 and tournament favourite Zhu Jiner looked like she had the game against fellow Chinese Tan Zhongyi in the bag but some questionable choices like not taking Black’s bishop on move 20 which would have amped up the attack on her opponent’s king cost her and the game ended up being a draw.
Round 1 results:
Open
Fabiano Caruana beat Hikaru Nakamura
R Praggnanandhaa beat Anish Giri
Matthias Bluebaum drew Wei Yi
Javokhir Sindarov beat Andrey Esipenko
Women
Divya Deshmukh drew Anna Muzychuk
Vaishali R drew Bibisara Assaubayeva
Aleksandra Goryachkina drew Kateryna Lagno
Zhu Jiner drew Tan Zhongyi
