World Champion Gukesh vs Women's World Cup winner Divya Deshmukh | FIDE Grand Swiss 2025

India's 88th Grandmaster and World Cup winner Divya Deshmukh is here on the board. She faces the world champion Domaraju Gukesh in the eighth round of the FIDE Grand Swiss. A big battle here especially for Divya Deshmukh as she faces the classical world champion. Gukesh has had tough three rounds. Before this one he lost three back-to-back encounters against Abhimanyu Mishra Nicholas Theodorou and Ediz Gurel and Divya on the other hand has been super solid in this event. She managed to beat Velimir Ivic, Amin Basim and she's actually half a point ahead of Gukesh. So she has down floated here to play against Gukesh who is on three points out of eight Divya three points out of seven. Divya is on three and half points and by the way both Gukesh and Divya know each other quite well from a very young age. In fact this is their second classical encounter. The first one was back in the day I think they were just 12 years old or so when they played in the Mumbai tournament in which was IIFL wealth at that point. So Gukesh with the white pieces will surely be looking to win this one. Meanwhile for Divya if she manages to beat Gukesh it will be a huge win. In fact the research suggested that a female player beating a classical world champion who's the reigning world champion has actually not happened. In fact whenever a women player had beaten a world champion they were not the world champion at that point perhaps in a classical game but maybe that fact has to be verified. Will Divya be the first one to do that? We have Sicilian on the board which shows Divya's fighting mood in this game. Knight to f3 by Gukesh and Divya brings out her knight to c6 and now will we see the open Sicilian with d4 or will Gukesh go for the Rosolimo? He goes for the Rosolimo with bishop to b5 putting pressure here. Pawn to e5 played and Gukesh simply castles here. Divya did play this same opening against Bassem Amin. I believe bishop e7 is a new idea here. Bishop d6 is a common move but this has been played before against Gukesh by Alexander Predke in 2023 Chennai Grandmasters. Rook e1 defending the pawn. She goes knight to d4 and Gukesh comes back to c4 rerouting the bishop on this important diagonal. Knight takes on f3 and queen takes f3 putting pressure here on f7. The knight jumps to f6 and pressurizing the e4 point. Gukesh goes d3. He's kind of making way for all his pieces to be well positioned. Knight c3, bishop g5 and so on. He brings his knight out to c3. Divya on the other hand does have this weakness on d5. She goes d6 but it's something which she can kind of shore it up right. She can play bishop e6, queen d7 and so on. a4 played and bishop comes out to e6 and Divya playing her moves quickly has some more time on the clock. h3 played and the queen comes up to d7. a5 played trying to gain more space on the queen side. a6 could be an idea here. Rook a d8. Maybe she's angling for the d5 break. Not so easy to play d5 because the e5 pawn would become weak. So Divya goes h6. Both players making slight improving moves here to figure out the way forward. It's a slow moving game. Queen e2 with the idea of f4 now and Divya goes knight e8. I like this maneuver. She wants to put her knight on c7. Also try for f5 whenever opportunity presents itself. f4 played by Gukesh and now this gives Divya some breathing space. Could have played a6 and kept that game in the similar kind of structure but after f4 pawn takes pawn, bishop takes pawn. Now we will see that bishop can come out on the f6 square and the bishop would be very well positioned on the long diagonal. So bishop to f6 is played and there's pressure on this diagonal. She goes pawn to e5. Now this move is pretty interesting by Gukesh because in a way, it kind of equalizes the space in the center, right? It just takes away the d6 pawn for the e4 pawn but what Gukesh feels is that his pieces are much better positioned for this opening of the position especially the knight on c3 which can jump into d5 and e4 while the knight on e8 is a bit passive. Divya goes in and gives a check. Now Gukesh takes the queen. Queen takes queen. Pawn takes which attacks the knight on c3 and you go knight to e4 and Gukesh is better here because the queenside pawns can start moving. Bishop comes to d5 and now a6 played trying to put pressure on the queenside. Pawn to b6 and one good idea here is knight g3 trying to come here. Rook e7 is on the cards. He goes knight d2 which is also a good plan. Wants to go to e7. Divya takes on c4. Taking with the pawn could be better as you then can start rolling the queenside pawns but Gukesh prefers to take with the knight. Maybe some sacrifices here at the right time to make a queen. Rook goes to d7. Wow! And stopping rook e7 here. Gukesh goes knight to e5 attacking the rook and rook d6. An important move because if you went rook c7, there was rook a4 attacking d4. So rook d6. Knight comes back to c4 and Divya comes back to d7. The position is even. Will Gukesh go for a draw? Not really. He's playing on. King f2. He wants to fight and I guess that's a decent decision. Although Divya's position now looks pretty good. Knight c7. Knight is keeping a pressure on the a6 pawn. Rook jumps in to e5 and here rook to c8. Rook starts putting pressure on the c2 pawn as well. King e2 played and next now you can push the pawn to b5 and later on knight a3 attacking the pawn on b5 but there is rook d6 which is a strong move and for Gukesh taking this pawn is not a good idea as c2 would hang. All of a sudden, Divya is actually going to win a pawn here by she's kind of outplayed Gukesh in that middle game. Although Gukesh brings his rook to f1 now, he is threatening the b5 pawn. A very good move could be rook e6 or rook g6 but b4 played and this helps the knight to come back to c4. Rook goes to e8 offering a trade of rooks. Rook takes rook, knight takes rook. Divya playing this in classy manner one must say that. She's right now a pawn up in the position but Gukesh is going after the d4 pawn which cannot be protected actually but Divya goes rook f6. Brilliant move because if rook d4, there's rook f2. He takes on d4 but there is rook f2 check and one must applaud the way in which Divya Deshmukh has played this endgame. Tremendous! King e3 and now you take the pawn on c2 or g2. Both are tempting. Takes on g2 because the threat of rook check and this could be quite deadly. Rook takes h3. She goes rook d, king f8 now. Knight d6 doesn't work because of king e7 attacking the rook and the knight. So rook goes to a8 and king e7 bringing the king in. Also not falling for knight d6 businesses here. Rook takes a7 check. Gukesh recovers the pawn. Now the material is even and 40 moves have been made as he gets up from the board. Divya goes king to e6 and presses the clock. So 40 moves also done for Divya and now Gukesh goes rook a6. He gives a check. King comes up to e7. Pawn to c3. Pawn takes pawn. Pawn takes pawn and now Divya goes rook g3. This actually now starts putting pressure on these pawns. The h3 pawn is falling and you know it could very much happen that Divya Deshmukh might start pressing for a win here. Gukesh taking risks and this has been kind of the trend that has happened in other games as well where Gukesh had an equal position but then pressed too hard and lost and Divya calmly brings her knight forward and Gukesh goes knight to f5 check. King f8 maybe here. King e8 played and the point is if you take on g7 but Gukesh goes rook b6. That's a mistake. I think knight g7 was much better. g6 now and Divya is actually getting a huge advantage. g6, knight has to go to d6 and then king e7 and she's doing well but instead she goes knight e6 check and that wasn't the most accurate move there by Divya. King c4 and she goes knight to f4 attacking the d3 pawn. Knight to g7 check and king to d7. Rook b5 played and rook takes pawn taken here. He takes the pawn on d3. Rook f5 attacking the knight and the pawn here on f7 and rook g3 played. Oh, that's a classy move attacking here. Rook takes f7 check and the material is now too low for even trying to win here for Gukesh and Divya also cannot win it here but let's see now. Still few more moves. Knight f5, she goes knight to g6 threatening a check to win the rook. So Gukesh goes rook to a7 and Divya plays knight to e5 check. King comes up to d5 and here Divya decides to sacrifice her knight to go into a rook knight versus rook endgame and interesting choice by her. It's move 56 because Gukesh will definitely play out this endgame till the very end. He would love to put some pressure here but it's clear that Divya knows this endgame well and she can hold it. Knight d4 and check. One of the things that white wants to do in such endgames is push the black king to the corner of the board and now rook a8 checkmate. So king to e8 and knight to f3 played. It comes a check, king e6 maybe plays this king to e6. Careful about some checks here. King d8 and with a rook bishop versus rook it's easier to kind of attack the opponent's king but with a knight and rook versus rook, it's slightly tougher and Divya, oh she was about to play her rook to c7 then put it back and finally does play rook c6. The thing is if knight f7, there's king c8, knight d6 check, king d8, nothing really happens there. So knight f7, king c8, so knight d6 check and king to d8 played. Rook takes rook, goes rook a6 and rook e7 check, king to d5 and he goes in rook to e1 check and king comes up to c7. Another check here and you will see that Gukesh isn't picking up that h-pawn and the reason for not doing that is because he wants to kind of, whenever he takes another 50 moves can be played from that point which is the reason why he might take it at like in a future point and Divya also can push the pawn but the moment you push a pawn again, the move counter resets to zero. Finally, Divya is like I need to push because otherwise Gukesh won't take and so let me push rook h7, h4 forcing Gukesh to take that pawn but Gukesh is not interested. He goes knight c4 check, king to d5 check here again and he goes king to c6, king d8 and knight e3 and rook g1, knight to c4 and rook c1 played. He plays king d6 check, king e6 played and h3, rook takes pawn, king comes up to c7 and goes rook to c3 check and here knight e3 played. King comes to d6, king e8 and the knight comes in. He's going knight e5 to king e6 and then rook c8 check, goes king f7 moving away the king and Gukesh checks. There have been knight rook versus rook endgame where the side with knight and rook have managed to win king g5 and one good example of that is Judith Polgar's battles again. There was one game against Garry Kasparov where she had lost. That was a rapid game and I think in general with 30 seconds extra per move, it's very difficult to to go wrong here. We are now on move number 90, rook f4 check, king comes to g3 and king f5 goes rook a8, check again to the king, king g2 and the rook comes to d3. Black also brings the rook here trying to cut the king off. Divya keeping her stamina intact here because Gukesh is known for grinding in such long endgames and inducing a mistake from his opponents. You can look at Gukesh how focused he is. He still believes he has an opportunity to win this. Rook goes back, now check, king comes to g2 and the rook moves to the side of the board. King f2, a knight comes in, king to e2 and well he's trying to get in closer, a check but the knight can block it now and Divya can escape with the king here. King d2, rook swings to the other side, king c2 and king d4 offering a draw here. Divya accepts it, a handshake. What a big game for Divya Deshmukh drawing against the classical world champion Gukesh and well look at their expressions. Both are pretty much exhausted after this long struggle.