Grand Chess Tour: Carlsen wins; Gukesh finishes 5th, Anand settles for 7th in Blitz event

Young Indian Grandmaster D. Gukesh finished fifth while his illustrious compatriot Viswanathan Anand could only manage a tied seventh place in the third leg of the 2023 SuperUnited Rapid and Blitz chess tournament.

Young Indian Grandmaster D. Gukesh finished fifth while his illustrious compatriot Viswanathan Anand could only manage a tied seventh place in the third leg of the 2023 SuperUnited Rapid and Blitz Chess tournament.

Gukesh, who had a moderate performance on Day 1 of the Blitz segment, bounced back well on the second day to pick up 6.5 points which included wins over Anand and top players like Fabiano Caruana (USA) and Jan-Krzysztof Duda (Poland). Gukesh, who beat Anand for the first time ever in tournament play in the Rapid segment, got the better of the five-time world champion in 34 moves in the blitz on July 9.

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The 17-year-old Indian star began the second day of the Blitz section with a win over Richard Rapport (Romania) and then stunned the highly-rated Caruana. After going down to World No. 1 Magnus Carlsen (Norway), Gukesh turned the tables on Anand.

A defeat to Alireza Firouzja was followed by three straight wins — over Constantin Lupulescu (Romania), Duda and Ivan Saric (Croatia). He ended the tournament with a draw against Ian Nepomniachtchi and a score of 19.5 points (Rapid + blitz).

Anand, who had started the tourney in style in the Rapid segment, had to endure a poor run, scoring only three points on Day 1 of the Blitz and logging 3.5 points on the second day. The veteran Indian ended with 16.5 points.