D Gukesh becomes World No. 3, Arjun and Praggnanandhaa in top-8; Viswanathan Anand slips to 12th in chess rankings

D Gukesh has been in dominant form since his World Chess Championship victory in Singapore in December last year. The Indian GM secured a hard-fought draw against Jorden van Foreest on Saturday, and now he shares the lead with R Praggnanandhaa, who defeated Alexey Sarana. Saturday’s Tata Steel Masters also saw Gukesh climb to third position in the live Elo ratings. The FIDE ratings haven’t been updated yet.

He is now the World No. 3 with a 2791.9 rating, and is behind second-placed Hikaru Nakamura (2802) and Magnus Carlsen (2833). Meanwhile, Fabiano Caruana is fourth with a 2790.2 rating, and is followed by Nodirbek Abdusattorov (2774), Arjun Erigaisi (2772), Praggnanandhaa (2763.3) and Alireza Firouzja (2759.9). Meanwhile, Viswanathan Anand has fallen from 10th to 12th position. The chess legend is the current FIDE deputy president and rarely participates in tournaments now. He was scheduled to take part in the first leg of the Freestyle Grand Slam Tour, but withdrew.

On Saturday, Gukesh after a highly complicated endgame and will face Arjun in the final round on Sunday. If both Gukesh and Praggnanandhaa lose in the final, then Abdusattorov has an outside shot at the playoffs.

Gukesh’s showdown vs Van Foreest was an epic encounter. The game reached its climax after the Dutch GM sacrificed the exchange with 34.Rxc4!?. Then five moves later, he missed the counterexchange sacrifice, played with three seconds on the clock. Both followed the winning line until 42…Rb1?, which gave White the advantage but Van Foreest missed that too. Then he took 30 seconds of his 19 minutes to take off the e-pawn and head for a draw.

After his draw, Gukesh was asked if he was following Praggnandhaa and Nodirbek’s games too. He replied, “A bit, but mostly I was just focussed on my game. It was clear that Abdu had done something wrong and Pragg was dominating from the start.”

On facing Arjun in the next round, he said, “Quite nice, I am already happy today that I managed to escape this game, but everything is set up for an exciting finish. I will just try to enjoy.”

After the Tata Steel Masters, Gukesh will travel to Germany for the first leg of the Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour, and will face the likes of Magnus Carlsen and Caruana.