The eleventh and final round of the European Championship was exciting and dramatic. After 10 rounds, Bluebaum and Yuffa were joint leaders with 8 points each, ahead of seven players with 7½ points each. In the last round, Bluebaum played with white against Azerbaijani grandmaster Nijat Abasov, who had made it into the 2024 Candidates Tournament in Toronto. Yuffa had black against Frederik Svane.
In the event of a tie for first place at the end of the tournament, the direct encounter was the deciding tiebreaker criterion. But only if two players were tied on points. If three or more players were tied on points, the Buchholz score would decide the champion.
With a win against Abasov, Bluebaum could have become European Champion outirght, as he had won the direct encounter against Yuffa, but he decided not to force his luck and offered Abasov a draw after only 5 moves. Abasov agreed, and Bluebaum had to hope that Yuffa would not manage to win with black against Frederik Svane.
But Frederik Svane made it exciting. He already had the draw in hand when he decided to play for a win with a bold pawn sacrifice. The engines were not enthusiastic about the pawn sacrifice, but at the board Yuffa did not find the right defence and Svane's courage to take risks was rewarded.
Svane was not the only player from the chasing pack with 7½ out of 10 to win in the final round. Maxim Rodshtein also managed this feat, winning against Armenian GM Shant Sargissian. This meant that Bluebaum, Svane and Rodshtein finished tied for first place with 8½ points each - i.e. the Buchholz score would decide the outcome.
Bluebaum was narrowly ahead here. He had 1 Buchholz point more than Svane and thus became European Champion 2025 and won took home €20,000 in prize money. Svane received €15,000 for second place, while Rodshtein got €10,000 for his third place.
Remarkably, Bluebaum is the first player in the 25 years of European Championship history to win the title twice. He had also won the 2022 edition in Brežice, Slovenia.
The podium
| Rk. | Name | Rtg | Pts. | TB1 | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | GM | Bluebaum, Matthias | 2643 | 8,5 | 0 | |
| 2 | GM | Svane, Frederik | 2654 | 8,5 | 0 | |
| 3 | GM | Rodshtein, Maxim | 2623 | 8,5 | 0 | |
| 4 | GM | Yuffa, Daniil | 2654 | 8 | 0 | |
| 5 | GM | Gledura, Benjamin | 2658 | 8 | 0 | |
| 6 | GM | Tari, Aryan | 2621 | 8 | 0 | |
| 7 | GM | Sargissian, Gabriel | 2628 | 8 | 0 | |
| 8 | GM | Abasov, Nijat | 2612 | 8 | 0 | |
| 9 | GM | Erdogmus, Yagiz Kaan | 2605 | 8 | 0 | |
| 10 | GM | Gurel, Ediz | 2620 | 8 | 0 | |
| 11 | GM | Kantor, Gergely | 2563 | 8 | 0 | |
| 12 | IM | Samadov, Read | 2502 | 8 | 0 | |
| 13 | GM | Jobava, Baadur | 2578 | 7,5 | 0 | |
| 14 | GM | Van Foreest, Jorden | 2676 | 7,5 | 0 | |
| 15 | GM | Kourkoulos-Arditis, Stamatis | 2580 | 7,5 | 0 | |
| 16 | GM | Navara, David | 2663 | 7,5 | 0 | |
| 17 | GM | Hovhannisyan, Robert | 2630 | 7,5 | 0 | |
| 18 | GM | Sargsyan, Shant | 2666 | 7,5 | 0 | |
| 19 | GM | Lagarde, Maxime | 2615 | 7,5 | 0 | |
| 20 | GM | Velten, Paul | 2515 | 7,5 | 0 | |
| 21 | GM | Martirosyan, Haik M. | 2652 | 7,5 | 0 | |
| 22 | GM | Saric, Ivan | 2652 | 7,5 | 0 | |
| 23 | GM | Ahmadzada, Ahmad | 2550 | 7,5 | 0 | |
| 24 | GM | Huschenbeth, Niclas | 2589 | 7,5 | 0 | |
| 25 | GM | Dardha, Daniel | 2665 | 7,5 | 0 | |
| 26 | GM | Gumularz, Szymon | 2591 | 7,5 | 0 | |
| 27 | GM | Suleymanli, Aydin | 2633 | 7,5 | 0 | |
| 28 | GM | Wojtaszek, Radoslaw | 2659 | 7,5 | 0 | |
| 29 | GM | Can, Emre | 2562 | 7,5 | 0 | |
| 30 | GM | Kuzubov, Yuriy | 2603 | 7,5 | 0 |
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