For nearly 5 minutes, Gukesh Dommaraju couldn’t bear to look both on the board or his opponent, Nodirbek Abdusattorov. He modified his posture over 15 occasions in that period, every place displaying a special diploma of torment along with his hand masking his face. Within the earlier 5 rounds of the Tata Metal Chess match, Gukesh has been eager to talk along with his opponents, often being the one to provoke a dialog with the opponent to attempt to analyze the sport and decide their thoughts. Right now, no phrases got here out of his mouth when Abdusattorov tried greater than as soon as to speak to him and analyse the sport.
It was that type of a morale-bruising outcome that stings for a very long time. The world champion suffered his first defeat of the yr on the Tata Metal match by the hands of Abdusattorov, due to a one-move blunder within the sixth spherical conflict. Gukesh was shell-shocked at himself for making the transfer and appeared to understand that he had made a deadly error a second after making it. He instantly resigned after Abdusattorov’s response.
Gukesh was shellshocked at himself for making the transfer and appeared to understand that he had made a deadly error a second after making it. He instantly resigned after Abdusattorov’s response. (Chessbase India dwell stream Screengrabs)
In the meantime, Friday noticed the opposite three Indians within the masters part—R Praggnanandhaa, Arjun Erigaisi and Aravindh Chitambaram—play out attracts.
Gukesh’s deadly error was pushing his rook forward by a sq. from g6 to g5, which in a web-based sport would have felt like a mouse slip. In any case, it left his pawn on f6 undefended from the prowling white queen on f5. Even Abdusattorov appeared puzzled by the transfer when it occurred, however shortly capitalised on the opponent’s error to assert the pawn and within the course of fork Gukesh’s king and rook.
INTERACTIVE: How Gukesh misplaced to Nodirbek Abdusattorov
Abdusattorov, whereas sympathetic to Gukesh’s state of affairs, referred to as the state of affairs “unexplainable” in an interview with Tata Metal Chess’ social media deal with.
“I really feel very sorry for him. It’s a horrible feeling. I’ve finished it myself many occasions. So it’s a fully horrible feeling,” a sympathetic Abdusattorov stated within the interview after his win. “This sport was just about regular. Sooner or later I feel he was getting excited and he was clearly attempting to push however I type of managed the margin. I assumed I had an excellent margin to attract and on the finish he was getting low on time and he felt nervous and he blundered horribly.”
“Truthfully, it’s very onerous to recuperate from a sport like this. Actually onerous,” stated IM Soumya Swaminathan on the Chessbase India dwell stream. “This was only a lapse of focus.”
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Gukesh sat rooted at his seat lengthy after the defeat, unable to course of how he had blundered away an equal-ish place. What was tougher to swallow was that the defeat got here towards Abdusattorov, who he had additionally misplaced to on the 2022 Chennai Olympiad, which had price the younger Indian crew a much-deserved gold medal.
This was Gukesh’s first defeat at Wijk aan Zee, in what’s the world champion’s first classical match of 2026, a yr the place he’ll defend his world championship crown in November-December. Gukesh had performed out 4 attracts in a row at first of the match earlier than successful his first sport towards Czech Republic’s Thai Dai Van Nguyen. That win had come simply earlier than Thursday’s relaxation day.
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