R Praggnanandhaa reigned supreme as he edged past D Gukesh in the tie-breaker of the Tata Chess Masters, in Wijk aan Zee, Netherlands. The result was a huge shock to Gukesh as the India No. 1 wasn’t even expected to be in that position, and at one point was at sole lead. But a dip in performances towards the end saw Praggnanandhaa catch up, and then the results on Round 13 forced a tie-breaker.
Arjun Erigaisi was probably the chaos maker as he defeated title contender Nodirbek Abdusattorov in the previous round, which also saw him end a 24-game winless streak at the Tata Masters. Then he followed it up with a sensational victory against Gukesh on Sunday. Meanwhile, Vincent Keymer, who assisted Gukesh during his World C’ship triumph, defeated Praggnanandhaa, to give the India No. 1 a fighting chance, although tie-breakers are not his forte and it was proved so.
Arjun Erigaisi reacts after defeating D Gukesh
Speaking after his win against Gukesh, Arjun was visibly euphoric and revealed that his confidence is back. The grandmaster began his campaign on a poor note, which also saw him lose his India No. 1 spot to Gukesh. “Yes, definitely. After yesterday’s win I was feeling pretty confident, today already. When I had such a tough start, I was very under-confident until yesterday.”
Analysing his performance in Wijk aan Zee, he stated, “You know, I think the start itself, like the first game, I should have just traded queens and turned into the opposite colour bishop endgame. I instead played on with queen e8. I think that was a bad decision looking back. But yeah, definitely very crucial was the game against Fedoseev. I blundered this tactic, which he spotted immediately. And that was a big blow.
Against Gukesh, Arjun was utterly dominant, winning a one-sided game with a 98.8% accuracy. During his campaign, he didn’t win a game for the first 11 rounds; losing four times, drawing seven and going down over 30 rating points and two spots in world rankings. But then out of the blue, he found the confidence and level to rise back up, and defeat two tournament leaders in the last two rounds.
According to the live Elo rankings, he is the current World No. 5 and India No. 2 with 2776.7 ratings. He ended 2024 as India. 1 but his poor campaign saw him lose that spot to Gukesh.
