India’s Vidit Gujrathi pulled off a stunner in Round 2 of the Candidates, defeating world No. 3 and tournament favourite Hikaru Nakamura with the Black pieces. It brought the American GM’s 47-classical-game unbeaten streak to an end. The last time Hikaru lost a classical game was back in the 2022 Candidates tournament, against current reigning world champion Ding Liren. This also marks Vidit’s first-ever win against Hikaru in classical chess.
In contrast to the all-draw affair of the opening round, all games in the Open section on Day turned out to be decisive. In addition to Vidit, D Gukesh, Fabiano Caruana and Ian Nepomniachtchi too won their respective games.
Vidit arrived at the board brimming with ideas. He baited Hikaru early by giving up a pawn only to land a blow with 11…Bxh3. A wonderful idea from Vidit, exploiting White’s lack of development on the queenside – with the rock, knight and bishop still languishing on their starting squares. The Indian was clearly in his preparation and Hikaru, who hadn’t seen this covert plan coming, appeared shaken. The American seemed annoyed at being the player who had to think longer on every move, while his opponent who’d seemingly out-prepared him, got to blitz out from the start and trap him with a dynamite idea. Hikaru went for 12. Nc4 pretty quickly after the Bxh3 shocker. “This will come back to haunt him,” Viswanathan Anand sighed on the commentary. The five-time world champion’s words would turn out to be prophetic.
“It (11… Bxh3) was part of my preparation, but after (Hikaru’s) 12.Nc4, I was on my own, Vidit said later, “For the rest of the game, I was thinking and trying to find out moves. Big thanks to my team for giving me such a nice start in the opening.” Vidit is accompanied by Surya Sekhar Ganguly and Daniel Vucaturo in Toronto. Surya was formerly second to Anand.
Vidit touched upon the many occasions that he’d got good positions against Hikaru in online and rapid chess in the past. “But I never managed to convert those wins. So today I was more precise and focused on converting. I did know that he hadn’t lost a single classical game this year…it’s good to defeat such a strong player,” he said, beaming. Vaishali too
In the all-Indian battle, at the start, Praggnanandhaa appeared to be comfortable in his preparation, blitzing moves and spending less than five minutes on the first ten moves. Gukesh – playing with Black – used up a good amount of time, thinking, and fell behind on the clock pretty early. In a race against time and up against Praggnanandhaa’s robust preparation, Gukesh held his calm. The duel turned manically complicated and it was Gukesh who emerged from it with a full point.
In the women’s section, Praggnanandhaa’s sibling Vaishali, too had a tough day, losing to former women’s world champion Tan Zhongyi. The latter has a flawless 2/2 score in the tournament at this point.
Round 2 results:
Open
Hikaru Nakamura 0-1 Vidit Gujrathi
R Praggnanandhaa 0-1 D Gukesh
Ian Nepomniachtchi 1-0 Alireza Firouzja
Fabiano Caruana 1-0 Nijat Abasov
Women
Kateryna Lagno ½-½ Koneru Humpy
Tan Zhongyi 1-0 Vaishali R
Nurgyul Salimova ½-½ Lei Tingjie
Aleksandra Goryachkina 1-0 Anna Muzychuk
Round 3 pairings
Open
Nijat Abasov-Hikaru Nakamura
Alireza Firouzja-Fabiano Caruana
D Gukesh – Ian Nepomniachtchi
Vidit Gujrathi- R Praggnanandhaa
Women
Anna Muzychuk-Kateryna Lagno
Lei Tingjie-Aleksandra Goryachkina
Vaishali R-Nurgyul Salimova
Koneru Humpy-Tan Zhongy
Where to watch: FIDE YouTube channel
When: April 6 14:30 EST (April 7, midnight IST)