World chess champ Ding, teen challenger even after six games

Singapore: The 2024 World Chess Championship remained finely poised on Sunday after defending champion Ding Liren and teenage challenger Gukesh Dommaraju played out a thrilling 46-move draw.

The score is tied at 3.0 points each after six games, rounding off the first week of the 14-game match.

Monday will be a rest day and play resumes Tuesday.

The 32-year-old champion from China started strongly, putting his 18-year-old Indian challenger on the defensive.

But Gukesh recovered to send the match down into a dramatic double-rook endgame, with pawns strewn across the board.

A threefold repetition after 46 moves from both players ended the game in a draw after more than four hours.

Critical moments

The Indian rejected a chance to end the game in a draw earlier despite being worse off on the board, and nearly paid for it.

“I just thought there was still a lot of play left in the position and I didn’t really see much danger for me,” Gukesh told reporters after the match on why he decided to play on.

“I wanted to play a longer game than just finishing at that point.”

Ding, who played with the white pieces, admitted that he had let his advantage slip at critical moments.

“That’s what I should improve in the next couple of games,” he said after the match.

Ding, who beat Russia’s Ian Nepomniachtchi to become the world champion in Kazakhstan last year, recorded a 42-move victory over Gukesh in game one Monday to end a winless run of 28 classical games dating back to January.

Their second encounter ended in a draw, but Gukesh hit back by winning game three on Wednesday when Ding lost on timing after he was unable to play his first 40 moves in 120 minutes.

After a rest day on Thursday, games four and five ended in draws.

There are 14 match days, with the first player to get 7.5 points declared the winner.

Tie breaks will take place if the players are tied on seven points after 14 games.

At his age, Gukesh is the youngest player in history to compete in the World Championship and he is looking to surpass Garry Kasparov as the youngest undisputed world chess champion.

He said Sunday he has happy to have rebounded from his first-game loss, but added the championship was still a long way to the finish.

“We are not even halfway through the event,” he said.