It was a sobering day for India at the 2026 FIDE Candidates, with R Praggnanandhaa losing, as R Vaishali and Divya Deshmukh continued their spate of draws in the Women’s Candidates.
Pragg loses to Sindarov in blunder-filled end
In the Open section, R Praggnanandhaa suffered a blow to his hopes, losing with white pieces to Javokhir Sindarov of Uzbekistan. Pragg is now a point behind joint-leaders Sindarov and Fabiano Caruana who beat Wei Yi to lead the standings on 2.5 points.
Unlike his first two games, Praggnanandhaa was bumped out of his preparation early on, as Sindarov responded to his Queen’s Gambit Declined opening with an unexpected ninth move, taking his rook to e8 – a line that had only been played 133 times in the chess database before.
Pragg pondered for over 20 minutes for his eleventh move, and attempted to lay long-term traps for Sindarov, going on to a pawn deficit but was also a piece up. The Indian was greatly down on time as Sindarov looked to have calculated a line that was playing out predictably for him, earning the 18-year-old Uzbek a slight advantage.
With the game mostly even, Sindarov pushed with pawns at the centre of the board and kept the pressure high on Pragg, who eventually succumbed to time pressure and made a couple of blunders on moves 33 and 34. While the line for victory was not obvious, Sindarov was able to find the moves and forced Pragg into a resignation on move 40.
The Uzbek now leads the Candidates alongside Caruana, while Praggnanandhaa is third alongside Matthias Blübaum, both a point behind. Anish Giri and Hikaru Nakamura played out an entertaining draw, as did Blübaum and Andrey Esipenko.
Caruana and Sindarov face off in the battle of the leaders tomorrow in Round 4, while Praggnanandhaa will have black pieces against Blübaum.
FIDE Candidates 2026 Open Round 3 results
-
R Praggnanandhaa 0 – 1 Javokhir Sindarov
-
Fabiano Caruana 1 – 0 Wei Yi
-
Matthias Blübaum 0.5 – 0.5 Andrey Esipenko
-
Hikaru Nakamura 0.5 – 0.5 Anish Giri
Vaishali, Divya grab draws to stay in the hunt
R Vaishali played out her third consecutive draw of the Women’s Candidates, against former world championship runner-up Anna Muzychuk.
Playing with white pieces, Vaishali opted for the ‘Italian Game: Two Knights, Modern Bishop’s’ opening, but only came out of it with a slight advantage. With Anna opting for the safer options as Vaishali tried to push there wasn’t any attacking lines on offer.
Both players played with a high level of accuracy and with nothing on offer, they had to accept a draw after the 41st move.
Meanwhile, Divya Deshmukh followed up her frustrating draw against Vaishali in Round 2 with a draw against former world championship runner-up Aleksandra Goryachkina. However, in contrast to Divya giving up a sizeable advantage in her previous game against Vaishali, this was the reverse.
The World Cup winner came out of the Sicilian Defence opening that Goryachkina employed with only a slight disadvantage with black pieces. While Divya trailed on the clock, her opponent kept up the pressure with accurate chess, hoping to force the young Indian into a blunder, but that never arose.
Nonetheless, Divya was a pawn down in the midgame and looked to have run out of options, however she held her nerve and kept her patience to play defensive and grab a draw in marathon 81-move contest.
Both Vaishali and Divya are a point off the lead, with Kateryna Lagno and Bibisara Assaubayeva leading the way on 2 points after earning incredible victories over Tan Zhongyi and Zhu Jiner in games that swung wildly.
In Round 4 tomorrow, Divya will play with white against Zhu Jiner, while Vaishali will also play in white against Aleksandra Goryachkina.
FIDE Women’s Candidates 2026 Round 3 results
-
Aleksandra Goryachkina 0.5 – 0.5 Divya Deshmukh
-
R Vaishali 0.5 – 0.5 Anna Muzychuk
-
Zhu Jiner 0 – 1 Bibisara Assaubayeva
-
Tan Zhongyi 0 – 1 Kateryna Lagno
