Chess Candidates 2024 Highlights, Round 8: Gukesh beats Vidit; Praggnanandhaa-Firoujza ends in draw; Humpy defeats Vaishali

And it is a draw. Abasov and Nepo shake hands after a threefold repetition. Nepo back in lead, a shared one with Gukesh though. 

One mistake too many from Vaishali and soon enough she concedes defeat. Koneru Humpy gets her first win of the tournament. 

Vaishali playing catchup now. Humpy with a solid chance to nab her first win of the tournament. Less than a minute on the clock for both players. 

Tingjie gets the win. Tan Zhongyi has lost for the first time this tournament. 

Tingjie goes level with Zhongyi and Goryachkina at the top of the standings in the women’s section. 

Nepo has a pawn advantage against Abasov now. A draw seems to be imminent. 

Leader Tan Zhongyi under the pump against Tingjie. This looks set to end as her first defeat of this tournament. 

Vaishali vs Humpy match is firmly in balance right now. Nothing to separate the two at this point. With plenty of time on the clock, this could take a while.. 

All eyes on the Abasov vs Nepo board now. A win would take Nepomniachtchi back to sole lead. A draw would put him level with Gukesh. 

Praggnanandhaa and Firouzja decide to call it a day. A knight and three pawns each was too little for either player to force a result. Draw it is. 

Caruana finally folds. It is a win for Nakamura against his old foe. It was an error-strewn game from Caruana. 

Lagno vs Goryachkina ends in a draw after a three-fold repetition. 

Vaishali claws her way back into the game after Humpy makes a series of badly calculated move. 

Vidit’s resistance is futile as Gukesh gets the right moves in. Gukesh wins and takes a tentative lead in the FIDE Candidates tournament. 

Vidit is taking his time with move 27. He needs to stay sharp here. One mistake and it will all go spiralling down for him. 

Hikaru meanwhile is putting pressure on Caruana. The world no. two is down in the clock as well. 

The time is almost evened out in the Vidit vs Gukesh match where the latter is still having a good initiative in this position. 

Lei Tingjie, who has won the last two rounds is putting a lot of pressure on leader Tan Zhongyi. Zhongyi only has five minutes on the clock and needs to play 15 more accurate moves to get 30 minutes extra time. 

Humpy is putting a lot of pressure on the f7 square, threatening checkmate and it seems there’s nothing that can save Vaishali now. 

The position in the Ian Nepomniachtchi vs Nijat Abasov game is heating up like anything. The Azerbaijani has played with an accuracy of 99.8, 0.2 more than his opponent and is asking tough questions after each move. 

Vidit is being outplayed by his young counterpart Gukesh.

Vaishali is in a complete messy position against Humpy, who is eyeing her rook. 

The queen rook battery on the a-file is a direct threat to Vidit. The position is heating up and he needs to be attentive since he is quite low on time compared to his counterpart Gukesh. 

“So far, it’s been pretty much a Nepo show, I would say... the narrative, you know, it’s all geared towards yet another Nepo victory.”

Anish Giri on Chess24 stream 

Vaishali is in a worse position right now. She miscalculated her knight to c5 move which might put her rook on the line. Looks like Humpy is heading for her first win of the tournament. 

Abasov, who had a time advantage of 20 minutes is now lower on the clock than Nepomniachtchi. The Russian is a tough nut to crack. 

The dark bishops are off the board in the Gukesh vs Vidit game. 

Vidit needs to be careful with his time management. He has often struggled under time crunch and has used almost an hour for just nine moves. Mind you, 40 moves needed to be played in the open category before getting the additional 30 minutes with 30-second increment per move. 

Both Pragg and Firouzja have equal time on the clock with an interesting opening on the board. 

Vaishali thought for 14 minutes before taking Humpy’s knight with her light bishop. She has 19 minutes less on the clock than Humpy. 

Surprise surprise! Nijat Abasov is the one who is having a slight initiative on the board against Nepomniachtchi with over 20 minutes extra than the Russian. Can we see an upset? 

Current position in the Humpy vs Vaishali game where the latter has a slightly inferior position with time crunch as well. 

Pragg has 16 minutes more than Firouzja with a slightly better position with white pieces. 

Vidit has offered his dark-squared bishop to Gukesh. 

Gukesh advances his h file pawn. Quite a weird set of moves from the 17-year-old Indian against compatriot Vidit. 

Pragg seems to be well-prepared in the current line of play. He has developed both of his knights and a bishop. He has offered a knight exchange and Firoujza needs to decide whether to take back from b pawn or e pawn. 

Ian Nepomniachtchi opens up his a-file by chopping Nijat Abasov’s second pawn. We can see a fast match progression in this board. 

A common Morphy Defense of Ruy Lopez is on the Hikaru Nakamura vs Fabiano Caruana game. Both Americans have short castled by the move no. 9. 

Gukesh plays an unusual a6 move, trying to open his extreme file quite too soon. This seemed to have confused Vidit, who had been thinking about his fifth move for over 15 minutes. 

Grünfeld Defense on the Humpy vs Vaishali board. 

Gukesh develops both his knights to start things off in the game against Vidit. 

And the live action starts now. Already an exchange happened in the Pragg vs Firouzja match where the Taimanov Variation of the Sicilian Defense is being played. 

So if you don’t know, there is a 15-minute delay in all the official broadcasts of the games to ensure anti-cheating measures. The live board will be activated at 12:15 IST.

Open Category

1. Ian Nepomniachtchi (RUS) - 4.5
2. D Gukesh (IND) - 4.0
3. Fabiano Caruana (USA) - 4.0
4. R Praggnanandhaa (IND) - 4.0
5. Hikaru Nakamura (USA) - 3.5
6. Vidit Gujrathi (IND) - 3.5
7. Alireza Firouzja (FRA) - 2.5
8. Nijat Abasov (AZE) - 2.0

Women’s Category

1. Tan Zhongyi (CHN) - 5.0
2. Aleksandra Goryachkina (RUS) - 4.5
3. Kateryna Lagno (RUS) - 4.0
4. Lei Tingjie (CHN) - 4.0
5. Nurgyul Salimova (BUL) - 3.0
6. Koneru Humpy (IND) - 2.5
7. R. Vaishali (IND) - 2.5
8. Anna Muzychuk (UKR) - 2.5

Where to watch the live stream of the Candidates 2024 chess?

The live streaming of the Candidates 2024 will be available on the FIDE YouTube channel.

Which TV channel will broadcast the Candidates 2024 chess?

There has been no official announcement for the broadcasting of the Candidates 2024 in India.

Open

Hikaru Nakamura - Fabiano Caruana 

Ian Nepomniachtchi - Nijat Abasov 

Praggnanandhaa R - Alireza Firouzja 

Vidit Santosh Gujrathi - Gukesh D 

Women’s

Kateryna Lagno - Aleksandra Goryachkina 

Nurgyul Salimova - Anna Muzychuk 

Tan Zhongyi - Lei Tingjie 

Humpy Koneru - Vaishali Rameshbabu

Hello and welcome to Sportstar’s live coverage of the FIDE Candidates 2024 round eight, happening at the Great Hall in Toronto, Canada on Sunday. Stay tuned as we bring you all the live updates.