R Vaishali has done it. She has won the Women’s Candidates tournament in her second appearance and booked her ticket to fighting for the ultimate prize in chess – the World Championship.
Here’s what we know about that World Championship match (which is admittedly not much yet). There are no dates for it yet, there’s no venue for it yet, but the players are set. And that means we can bring you a sense of what to expect in this way-too-early preview:
Who is Vaishali facing?
A behemoth. The juggernaut that is China’s Ju Wenjun. Since 2018, Ju has won five World Championship titles in a row. Four of those were in a 12-game match, while one, back in 2018, was in a 64-player knockout tournament.
In the latest FIDE women’s rankings, Ju is third in the world, behind her compatriot Hou Yifan and Lei Tingjie. However, Hou is barely an active player anymore, and Lei is only ahead of Ju because the reigning world champion doesn’t play too much classical chess anymore. In fact, in 2025, the only classical chess she played outside of her World Championship match against Tan Zhongyi was at the Norway Chess tournament, where she finished fourth behind eventual champion Anna Muzychuk, Lei, and India’s Koneru Humpy.
Does that mean Ju could be vulnerable?
There could be a sense of vulnerability when a player had not competed that often in a format. However, there are a few opportunities for Ju to play classical chess before the World Championships, notably at the Norway Chess tournament in May, and then the FIDE Olympiad in September.
It doesn’t take much for Ju to find rhythm. Between the 2023 and 2025 World Championship matches, she only played four tournaments in the classical format and then went on to win the World Championship match with three games to spare against Tan, by a 6.5-2.5 scoreline.
That’s how good she can be, and if she’s anywhere near those levels, then Vaishali will need to raise her game by several notches to give her a fight.
Has Vaishali faced Ju before?
A fair few times. And if you’re supporting the Indian, the head-to-head doesn’t make for pretty reading. Vaishali has not registered a win against Ju yet in no time format.
In four classical games against Ju, Vaishali has drawn three and lost one. The two players faced each other at last year’s Norway Chess women’s tournament and drew both classical games. In the Armageddon games that followed the draws in classical, Ju won once with the white pieces, and Vaishali won once with the white pieces.
That Armageddon win in Round 8 of that tournament is Vaishali’s only win against Ju in any time control so far in her career.
So, does Vaishali actually have a chance to win?
It’s way too early to say whether she has a chance. But there’s evidence that past form or head-to-head record count for little when heading into a World Championship match. Vaishali will have a whole new level of focused preparation heading into this match.
Having said that, there must be no qualms for Vaishali and her team to admit that, as things stand, she will be the underdog. Such is the force of Ju’s pedigree and the history that is on her side.
Has anyone said anything yet about the match?
Very little, understandably so, because there’s so much time left to go for it. RB Ramesh, Vaishali’s long-time coach told ESPN that he will wait for this initial excitement and media frenzy to die down before sitting down with Vaishali and deciding her path ahead – including decisions about which tournaments she plays, how many breaks she takes, what the composition of her team will be, and all those other details that need to be taken care of before a match like this.
Is there anything else to watch out for?
There is one person whose moves might be worth looking out for. India’s Pentala Harikrishna has been a second for Ju at a World Championship match before, in 2023, when she beat Lei. The year after that, Harikrishna was part of Gukesh’s team of seconds when he won the World Championship match in Singapore against China’s Ding Liren.
Ju has gone through another World Championship match after without Harikrishna being on her team, so he may not be involved with the Chinese again for this match. However, can he be involved with Vaishali against a player that he knows as well as he does? Only time will tell.
And finally, where will the World Championship be held?
If the formula from the last three World Championship matches are followed, there will be a six-game split between Shanghai, Ju’s hometown and Chennai, Vaishali’s hometown.
Ju’s World Championship matches against Lei and Tan were split between Shanghai and Chongqing, while the match against Aleksandra Goryachkina in 2020 was split between Shanghai and Vladivostok in Russia.
There’s no clarity yet on the host city (or cities) for either the match between Gukesh Dommaraju and Javokhir Sindarov for the world title in the open section or the women’s match between Ju and Vaishali, though.
