Sinquefield Cup: Gukesh draws with Giri; Praggnanandhaa holds Caruana in round eight

India’s Grandmasters D Gukesh and R Praggnanadhaa played out their eighth draw in as many games at the Sinquefield Cup, which is a part of the Grand Chess Tour.

While World Championship challenger Gukesh signed peace with Anish Giri of Holland in just 23 moves, Praggnanadhaa too followed suit and drew with local favourite Fabiano Caruana in 28 moves.

With all the games ending in draws in the eighth round, Alireza Firouzja of France won the Grand Chess Tour with one round to spare here and became entitled to a USD 100,000 bonus after his successful stint throughout.

In the eighth round, Firouzja played out the longest game which also ended peacefully after 80 moves against Russian Ian Nepomniachtchi.

In the two other games of the day in the ten-player double round-robin tournament, Nodirbek Abdusattorov of Uzbekistan split the point with Ding Liren of China and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave of France drew with Wesley So of the United States.

Alireza took his tally to an unassailable 5.5 points out of eight games and Caruana is the only player who can catch him on the points table provided Alireza loses his final bout against Praggnanandhaa and the American himself beats Giri.

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Even if he loses, Alireza will win the tour for the first time thanks to his superior points tally overall.

“It’s very tough to win a tour. Any tour is tough to win, but this is the strongest tour in the world. Very happy, but it’s very tiring and feeling exhausted but, I’m very happy”, Alireza noted.

The third place is still shared by five players on four points apiece. They are Gukesh, Praggnanandhaa, Vachier-Lagrave, So and Abdusattorov.

Nepomniachtchi and Liren come in next on 3.5 points, a half point clear of Anish Giri who is at the last spot.

Gukesh had to work quite less out of a routine Ruy Lopez as black as Giri went for a couple of pawn grabs in the early middle game to shake hands via repetition of moves.

Praggnanandhaa started off with the English opening and faced one of Caruana’s pet variations. The result here was a draw also through repetition of moves.