World Champion D Gukesh loses consecutive games in his strongest format

World Champion D Gukesh has lost consecutive games in the Grand Swiss 2025 at Samarkand in Uzbekistan. A day after he was beaten by the youngest-ever GM, Abhimanyu Mishra, Gukesh lost to Greek GM Nikolas Theodorou in their round 6 game.

Gukesh lost with white pieces in a rook end game that lasted 47 moves. Gukesh (3 points) has fallen 2 points behind event leader Iranian Parham Maghsoodloo, who maintained his unbeaten run with a draw against Arjun Erigaisi. R Praggnanandhaa (3.5) was held to a draw by Rauf Mamedov.

India No 2 Erigaisi is joint-second on 4.5 points, alongside Mishra and three others, including India's Malayali GM Nihal Sarin. Thrissur native Nihal defeated Polish GM Szymon Gumularz to make it consecutive wins and keep himself in the hunt for the title.

GM S L Narayanan, the second Malayali in the event, split a point with Nils Grandelius, making it six draws in a row. The native of Thiruvananthapuram has 3 points.

Meanwhile, GM Divya Deshmukh bounced back from a defeat to draw against GM Gabriel Sargissian to take his tally to 2.5 points. Divya, who recently won the World Cup, has scored positive results against four 2600-plus-rated GMs in the Grand Swiss.