Chennai GMs: Firouzja outplays Pranesh in fighting first round

Firouzja early leader

The fourth edition of the Quantbox Chennai Grand Masters began on Thursday. Unlike last year's edition, which featured two concurrent ten-player events - the Masters and the Challengers - this year's tournament consists of a single eight-player field.

Despite the reduction in size, the lineup remains formidable. Seven of the participants are rated above 2700, with Pranesh M completing the field after winning the Challengers in 2025. Top-ten players Nodirbek Abdusattorov and Arjun Erigaisi are the first and second seeds, while reigning world champion Gukesh Dommaraju is competing in his home city. Alireza Firouzja, Hans Niemann, Nihal Sarin and Dmitry Andreikin are the other participants.

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Only one of the four games in the opening round ended decisively, although the three draws were all hard-fought encounters in which one player obtained strong winning chances.

Video: ChessBase India

Firouzja was the day's sole winner, defeating underdog Pranesh with the black pieces. The result also lifted Firouzja, who had entered the event ranked 12^th in the world, into the top ten of the live ratings list.

Playing a Sicilian Sveshnikov, Firouzja gained an edge out of the opening and maintained the pressure throughout the middlegame. He eventually won a pawn before simplifying into an endgame in which he had a rook, a knight and six pawns against two rooks and three pawns (i.e. three pawns for the exchange). Converting the position was far from straightforward, but Firouzja showed good technique to secure the full point.

Pranesh 0-1 Firouzja

Annotations by GM Karsten Müller

Top seed Abdusattorov found himself on the worse side of a Queen's Gambit Declined despite having the white pieces against Niemann. The Uzbek grandmaster employed a rather experimental line and was forced to defend tenaciously in a pawn-down position before escaping with a draw.

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Gukesh also needed to play accurately to hold his game with white against Nihal. The two Indian players entered the tournament with exactly the same rating, and Nihal obtained the better chances before the world champion managed to secure a draw.

Nodirbek Abdusattorov v. Hans Niemann | Photo: Tushar Damor

The remaining game saw Andreikin escape with a draw against Erigaisi after 32.Qc7?! allowed him to force a perpetual check.

Erigaisi could instead have played 32.Rf3, keeping the pressure on his opponent. Although there was no straightforward continuation leading to a clear advantage, Erigaisi had around half an hour on his clock compared with Andreikin's seven minutes and could have continued testing him in time trouble.

After the text move, however, there followed 32...Bxd2 33.Qxb7 (the rook is trapped on a6) Qb1+ 34.Kh2 Bf4+ 35.g3 Qc2

Erigaisi spent seven minutes before capturing the rook with 36.Qxa6, effectively agreeing to a draw since Black gets a perpetual check starting with 36...Qxf2+. Erigaisi correctly calculated that 36.Kg2 Qe4+ also led to a draw by perpetual.

Standings after round 1

All games

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