D Gukesh’s winless run continued as he lost to Alireza Firouzja on Friday, to finish in eighth place and without a single win at the Weissenhaus Freestyle Chess Grand Slam event in Wangels (Germany).
Gukesh had lost to Firouzja in the round-robin stage, and was fighting with Firouzja for seventh place. The India No. 1 made a sensational comeback in the previous game on Thursday as he secured a draw. But Firouzja wasn’t having it on Saturday as she scored his first knockout win to finish in seventh spot and earn 30,000 dollars.
How much did D Gukesh earn?
Meanwhile, Gukesh was awarded 20,000 dollars for finishing in eighth place. Vincent Keymer who defeated Fabiano Caruana in the finals pocketed 200,000 dollars. On the other hand, Caruana got 140,000 dollars. World No. 1 Magnus Carlsen, who lost to Keymer in the semi-finals, came third and got 100,000 dollars. Javokhir Sindarov came fourth to earn 60,000 dollars and fifth-placed Hikaru Nakamura got 50,000 dollars.
Sixth-placed Nodirbek Abdusattorov won 40,000 dollars and Levon Aronian came ninth to receive 12,500 dollars. Also, Vladimir Fedoseev came 10th to bag 7,500 dollars.
Gukesh has received criticism from some section of fans for his winless campaign at Weissenhaus. Many have felt that he is weaker in Chess960 and in shorter formats, where creativity is needed. The reigning world champion was in dominant form in Wijk aan Zee in January, losing to R Praggnanandhaa in the title-decider tie-breaker. Meanwhile, Nakamura who beat Gukesh in the first Grand Slam, pointed out that his biggest weakness could be his intuition.
Speaking to Chess.com, he said, “I would say probably the biggest weakness Gukesh currently has is that when he gets low on time, I don’t think his intuition is that great, and he simply couldn’t work through the calculations.”
“I think it can only be to your disadvantage if you don’t analyze together. I don’t know why Gukesh doesn’t analyze with Fabiano. To me, that’s just insane. Whether I’m analyzing with Fabiano, or even if I’m not, I look at his game, and I just try to follow what he does. You know, I just believe in Fabiano, so it’s much easier if you can do that,” he added.
