St. Louis Rapid And Blitz: D Gukesh Downs Fabiano Caruana And Wesley So To Climb To Fourth

Teenage Indian World champion D Gukesh climbed to the fourth place in the table at the St. Louis Rapid and Blitz as he got the better of the American duo of Wesley So and Fabiano Caruana despite his shock defeat at the hands of Leinier Dominguez Perez on Thursday.

Gukesh started the day with a loss, for the third straight day, and yet managed a fourth spot, with 18 blitz games still to be played in the USD 1,75,000 prize-money tournament, which is part of the Grand Chess Tour.

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Caruana topped the rapid round with 14 points, despite a loss against Gukesh. Following him is Levon Aronian, now representing the USA, with 13 points. Maxime Vachier-Lagrave from France is in third place with 11 points, just one point ahead of Gukesh, who has had a mixed performance so far.

Dominguez, Wesley So, and Uzbekistan’s Nodirbek Abdusattorov share the fifth spot with nine points, two points ahead of Liem Le Quang from Vietnam.

American Sam Shankland is ninth with five points, while Grigoriy Oparin is last with just three points.

Gukesh had a promising position against Dominguez but faltered in the final stages of the middle game, allowing Dominguez to invade the seventh rank, which proved decisive.

Gukesh also had a decent position with significant compensation for a pawn against Wesley So. So was unable to handle the pressure and succumbed in the penultimate round of rapid.

In the final round, Caruana nearly outplayed Gukesh, but a critical oversight cost him dearly, shifting the advantage decisively in Gukesh’s favour.

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Results round 7:

D Gukesh (Ind) lost to Leinier Dominguez Perez (Usa); Levon Aronian (USA) beat Sam Shankland (USA); Nodirbek Abdusattorov (Uzb) drew with Maxime Vachier-Lagrave (Fra); Grigoriy Oparin (USA) lost to Fabiano Caruana (USA); Liem Le Quang (Vie) drew with Wesley So (USA).

Round 8:

Wesley lost to Gukesh; Caruana beat Liem; Dominguez drew with Vachier-Lagrave; Shankland drew with Abdusattorov; Oparin lost to Wesley.

Round 9:

Gukesh beat Caruana; Liem drew with Aronian; Abdusattorov beat Dominguez; Oparin lost to Shankland; Wesley beat Oparin.

Standing after Round 9 (Rapid):

1. Caruana (14); 2. Aronian (13), 3. Vachier-Lagrave (11); 4. Gukesh (10); 5-7: Dominguez, Abdusattorov, Wesley (9 each); 8: Liem (7); 9. Shankland (5); 10. Oparin (3).