FIDE Candidates 2024

[sameerph]

Gukesh with an excellent win against Alireza in penultimate round and now he takes sole lead with 8.5 points.

Pragg lost unfortunately against Fabiano Caruana and now his chances are gone.

Gukesh at 8.5, Caruana, Nakamura and Nepo all a 8. All 4 have chances of winning. Nepo against Fabi and Gukesh against Naka in final round.

A win will give Gukesh the title, a draw and he will have to wait the result of winner between Nepo and Fabi and play the winner in rapid. If that one too ends in a draw, Gukesh still ends up winner.

[sameerph]

Both the ties ended in draws in last round and Gukesh becomes the youngest ever candidates winner.

[Sin Hombre]

Bit of a shame that the board is not celebrating this more.

This is the equivalent of an Indian winning a Masters 1000 event in tennis even when adjusting for the sports/game's relative popularity.

Gukesh just became the youngest World Championship contender at 17. Younger than Carlsen, younger than Kasparov, younger than Karpov. He finished ahead of world 2, 3 and 4 to do this.


Also a brief shoutout to Vaishali. She started ok (2.5/5), then had a terrible terrible run where she lost 5 matches in a row and then turned it around to win 5 in a row and finish T-2. Humpy also finished strong to finish in that tie for 2nd.

Pragg did well too for his first Candidates appearance to finish even for the 5th spot. Vidit had an up and down tournament, where his weak nerves gave in on a few times, and finished -2.

[arjun2761]

Pretty amazing achievement for Gukesh!! He also moves to #6 in the world rankings. Based on his performance here, he may be underranked!

[rajitghosh]

This event bodes well for the future of Indian chess. A world champion after Anand is a distinct possibility now. In fact rating difference of Gukesh and Dirren is not much so he has a good chance.

[PKBasu]

Congrats to Gukesh.

We are a true global powerhouse of Chess now. I remember how much of a struggle it was for Manuel Aaron, and a slow stream of others, to gain the International Master designation. Only in 1988 did we have our first Indian Grandmaster, Vishy Anand, followed three years later by Dibyendu Barua. We've come a long way: 83 Indian Grandmasters now! So the GM title is no longer something we get too excited about. When I first started following chess, an Indian becoming IM was newsworthy!

[prasen9]

Carlsen wanted to play Alireza. Gukesh trounced him (okay in one match). Maybe Gukesh becomes the WC and then Carlsen would want to play him? Gukesh is 1 point ahead of Diren in ELO Live Ratings. So, he is the favorite.

Part of the lack of celebration maybe because the board was down twice! But, yes, there are fewer chess fans than tennis.

[srini]

Gukesh is 1 point ahead of Diren in ELO Live Ratings. So, he is the favorite.

Gukesh infact seems to be the favorite, as D Liren seems to be coming back from some state of D'Lirium and hasn't done too well at Tata open in Jan this year(he took break for some mental illness it seems). If Liren is not telling Lies for psych-ops then Gukesh would be favorite.

[prasen9]

Sorry for the typo. I hope he is Raining Lies and gets Dinged.

This also sort of shows the illegitimacy of the candidacy style tournament. The holder of the title gets a huge gain in this system. And, if he or she is not in form, then there is no correction. Ideally, there should be a cutoff and the top two players at that date by ranking should qualify for the finals provided the top two players have played a certain number of matches in the last couple of years or so.

[srini]

I hope he is Raining Lies and gets Dinged.