World Chess Championship 2024, Game 4: Gukesh holds Ding Liren despite surprise opening from defending champion

Gukesh must have been the happier of the two, as he denied Ding, the defending champion, any advantage he may have hoped for with the white pieces.

Five-time world champion Viswanathan Anand (centre) makes a ceremonial move during India’s D Gukesh’s (right) match against China’s Ding Liren at the FIDE World Championship 2024 in Singapore on Friday. | Photo Credit: PTI

Viswanathan Anand almost smiled and pushed the pawn in front of the black king by two squares. He was making a ceremonial move for D. Gukesh.

That could well be one of the enduring images from the World Chess Championship in Singapore – Anand, the man who inspired a country to take up chess and then mentoring a bunch of big talents, standing beside the boy who could be king, on the biggest stage of world chess.

Gukesh did no harm to his chances towards achieving that goal. He drew the fourth game with black pieces with Ding Liren at Resorts World Sentosa on Friday. He must have been the happier of the two, as he denied the defending champion any advantage he may have hoped for with the white pieces. The score is now 2-2 in this best-of-14 match.

Ding, yet again, did manage to surprise Gukesh with his choice of opening. He began by taking his knight to the f3 square. The opening would turn into a reversed version of Queen’s Indian Defence.

HIGHLIGHTS | World Chess Championship 2024, Game 4

Gukesh would later admit that he wasn’t expecting that from Ding and that he had to reply to White’s moves over the board, and not from preparation. He did that rather well, though.

It had become obvious that Ding would not be minding a draw with white pieces, for the second straight time in the match. On his 16th move, he chose to take his knight to the f3 square, rather than a sharper line involving his light-squared bishop.

The following move saw the knights being exchanged. That was the beginning of the simplification of the position as more pieces were traded.

The queens left the board by the 36th and the players reached a rook-and-pawn ending that was clearly going to be drawn. Four moves later, the game was indeed drawn, as the same position repeated three times.

It was quite an even game in just about every aspect. For the first time in the match, there was equality on the clock: neither player had to be worried about the time pressure. The accuracy level was also pretty similar, about 99 percent.

After the game, Ding said that he had wanted to surprise Gukesh. “I had a day to recover after a tough loss (in the third game) and wanted to surprise my opponent with this opening idea,” he said. “And it worked well. It was not so bad.”

Neither was it for Gukesh.