Sindarov Takes Down Caruana To Grab Sole Lead; Giri Beats Esipenko

GM Javokhir Sindarov grabbed the sole lead at the 2026 FIDE Candidates Tournament on Wednesday, reaching a fantastic plus-three score by beating co-leader GM Fabiano Caruana. GM Anish Giri got back to a 50-percent score by beating GM Andrey Esipenko in a wild Najdorf game. GM Wei Yi vs. GM Hikaru Nakamura and GM Matthias Bluebaum vs. GM Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu ended in draws.

Late entry GM Anna Muzychuk defeated GM Kateryna Lagno to catch GM Bibisara Assaubayeva in the lead in the 2026 FIDE Women's Candidates as the latter drew with GM Tan Zhongyi. GM Zhu Jiner beat GM Divya Deshmukh, while GM Vaishali Rameshbabu escaped with a draw vs. GM Aleksandra Goryachkina.

Thursday is the first rest day. Round five is on Friday, April 3, starting at 8:45 a.m. ET / 14:45 CEST / 6:15 p.m. IST.

• FIDE Candidates: Sindarov Sole Leader
• FIDE Women's Candidates: Muzychuk Catches Assaubayeva

FIDE Candidates: Sindarov Sole Leader

On the day when the rest of the island celebrated Cyprus National Day, Sindarov scored his third win in the tournament, while Giri got his first full point.

Candidates Round 4 Results

Debutant or not, the leader is a full point ahead of the pack going into the first rest day.

Candidates Standings After Round 4

Javokhir Sindarov 1-0 Fabiano Caruana

He's only 20 years old and is playing his first Candidates Tournament, but that hasn't stopped Sindarov from having the best-ever start in any Candidates in this format: 3.5/4. (We have to go back to 1959 to find the same score by GM Tigran Petrosian in the 1959 Candidates, which was an eight-player quadruple round-robin.)

The 2025 World Cup winner won the important clash with co-leader Caruana to establish a full-point gap over his nearest rival. His great start of three wins and one draw took the young Uzbek to world number six in the live ratings.

“I kind of got caught in the opening,” was Caruana's matter-of-fact summary of his loss today. It wasn't surprising that Sindarov did most of the talking at the press conference, and he agreed that a large part of his win was based on preparation.

I kind of got caught in the opening.
—Fabiano Caruana

"Of course I never imagined I would go into the rest day with plus three but today I played a really [good] game and the prep was also fantastic, thanks to my seconds," Sindarov told Chess.com's FM Mike Klein. Sindarov further noted that he was particularly proud to achieve this success in preparation against the highly experienced Caruana, and that he had been lucky to have repeated this specific line of the Queen's Gambit Accepted before the game. 

Still, there was some confusion over Black's decisive mistake. Caruana thought it was 16...Rg8 and Sindarov agreed with him, but engine analysis shows that it was Caruana's 17th move that was the real issue.

As it went, the American GM had to sacrifice his a-pawn to avoid trouble with his king, but long term, his open king's position became problematic anyway. The fact that Caruana got low on time early (he went under 10 minutes while pondering his 20th move) didn't help either.

GM Rafael Leitao analyzes the Game of the Day below.

Andrey Esipenko 0-1 Anish Giri

Also in the other decisive game of the day, preparation was the buzz word during the press conference and post-game interviews. It all started with Giri playing his second Sicilian of the tournament and each time that happens the question (asking for a friend!) is if he still follows his own Chessable Najdorf Lifetime Repertoire.

In this case, he did, but Esipenko's 7.Bd3 move is not mentioned in that course from 2020. (Giri did promise to include it in a future course.) The Dutchman was well prepared for it anyway and blitzed out his opening moves, which included putting his king on the d7-square on move 11!

“Black has a million ways of fixing this line,” said Giri. “I was hoping no opponent will think I’m sick enough to actually go for this. But then Andrey continued playing fast and that was not the plan.”

I was hoping no opponent will think I’m sick enough to actually go for this.
—Anish Giri

“I couldn’t remember some things during the game,” Esipenko said, adding that he wasn't sure when b2-b4 was supposed to be played. His 16.b4 looks fine though. It seems like Giri was the first to mix up the preparation with 17...Nxd3?! but then Esipenko mixed (messed?) it up even more with 18.Qxd3? where 18.Rxd3 would have been quite promising for White.

The Russian player underestimated the somewhat strange-looking 18...Ba4! after which Black has nothing to fear anymore and took over the game.

“18...Ba4 is an amazing move,” said Giri. “He has nothing. I spent a lot of time and then I realized he was lost, or rather, I didn’t see a draw for him.” Without wanting to elaborate, he added: “It's a typical mistake for a certain type of player, included myself as well.”

Wei Yi ½-½ Hikaru Nakamura

The longest game of the round had an interesting opening phase and then an even more interesting endgame phase. First, it seems that Wei managed to maneuver his opponent into a 6.Bc4 Najdorf which Nakamura hadn't exactly prepared for. The American GM then decided to turn it into a Dragadorf with 6...g6, knowing the risks.

“I took a lot of risk obviously,” he said. “I know I had something very similar against Kramnik many years ago in Norway where I was just completely lost, it was a blitz game before the tournament. So I was familiar with the risk involved, but when I saw Fabi’s game, basically the imbalance both in the position and on the clock, I was almost certain it was going to be a decisive one one way or the other and I figured: why not do something creative? If I lose, I lose, but you have to try to win some games.”

If I lose, I lose, but you have to try to win some games.
—Hikaru Nakamura

Wei clearly wasn't prepared for this turn of events as he didn't play the most critical line (which is basically a Yugoslav Attack setup with a quick Qd2 and 0-0-0) but went for the positional 10.a4 instead. This allowed Nakamura to equalize quickly, and the game remained level until just before the time control.

In a double rook endgame with three against three on the kingside, everyone expected the players to be shaking hands soon when Wei suddenly erred on the last move before the time control, when he had 40 seconds left on the clock.

The h-pawn was going to drop anyway but 40.Kh2? was rather an unfortunate way to lose it. Normally speaking, it doesn't matter much if it's three vs. three or two vs. three, but in this specific constellation and with four rooks on the board instead of two, Black was actually winning for a few moves.

Nakamura missed his first chance and then also another. About the first opportunity, he said: “The concept I had in mind didn’t quite work. I did consider this 43...h4 move, which is supposed to be winning. I’m disappointed but it’s not an easy win.”

In his recap Nakamura noted that he really should have seen the second one: “Had I played 45...Kg5 I think there was a 80-85 percent chance to win this game.” At the end of the video, he said: “The cookie simply hasn’t crumbled in my favor and that’s really just how life goes sometimes.”

The cookie simply hasn’t crumbled in my favor, and that’s really just how life goes sometimes.
—Hikaru Nakamura

Below is that recap by Nakamura, well recommended for anyone trying to understand this rook endgame better.

Matthias Bluebaum ½-½ Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu

Alongside all the spectacle on the other boards, this game was as quiet as can be. Interestingly, Bluebaum got to play his third isolated queen's pawn (IQP) position in as many white games, but it didn't bring any chance of an advantage. No doubt GM Vishy Anand was at least part of what inspired Praggnanandhaa to play 5...a6 and the latest representation of India in the Candidates handled it well.

FIDE Candidates: Round 5 Pairings 

FIDE Women's Candidates: Muzychuk Catches Assaubayeva

Like in the Open, there were two decisive games, with wins for Muzychuk and Zhu.

Women's Candidates Round 4 Results

Women's Candidates Standings After Round 4

Anna Muzychuk 1-0 Kateryna Lagno

Luck was finally running out for Lagno in today's game with Muzychuk. Ironically, unlike all the craziness from the earlier rounds, the Russian GM was mostly safe in her black game today and really inflicted the loss upon herself with her 28th move.

You could say that Muzychuk was rewarded for her fighting spirit: first, she went for a slightly speculative piece sacrifice on move 20 (“I just thought it is an interesting way but yeah, of course there were also possibilities of not to sacrifice,“ she said. “I thought 20.Bxa5 was interesting“) and later on she avoided a move repetition.

Divya Desmukh 0-1 Zhu Jiner

This game was the story of the black player successfully confusing her opponent in the opening. Zhu played the 2...Bb4 line in the 1...e5 English (a reversed Rossolimo) but with the cunning 6...Nf6 she avoided the main line. Divya still continued to play the best moves for a while, but at some point she chose the wrong setup on the kingside, and the position became very difficult to handle. After she missed two chances to create some chaos with an exchange sacrifice, the Indian GM soon found herself in a hopeless situation.

Vaishali Rameshbabu ½-½ Aleksandra Goryachkina

Vaishali will be happy that she got away with a draw today, because she was in quite a bit of trouble. Pushing the a-pawn all the way to a6 looked premature, and with 17...d4! Goryachkina seemed on her way to a big advantage. One move later she made the wrong decision though and Vaishali could solve everything tactically.

Bibisara Assaubayeva ½-½ Tan Zhongyi

Assaubayeva seemed to have good chances to score a full point and take the sole lead. The position out of the opening, a Tarrasch, looked quite promising and it seems there might have been a better way to continue around move 18. As it went, she allowed Tan to get back into the game. The Chinese GM showed an impressive piece of calculation.

FIDE Women's Candidates: Round 5 Pairings 

The FIDE Candidates Tournament is the most important FIDE tournament of the year. In the Open and Women's events, eight players play each other twice for the right to challenge the FIDE World Champions Gukesh Dommaraju and Ju Wenjun to a match for the title.

Previous coverage:

• Round 3: Caruana Wins In 19 Moves, Sindarov Beats Praggnanandhaa With Piece Sac
• Round 2: Vaishali, Lagno Escape With Sacrifices On Day Of Draws
• Round 1: Caruana, Pragg, Sindarov All Win In Stunning Start To 2026 Candidates
• Nakamura Rejects ‘Completely Wrong’ 40% Odds; Caruana Calls Tier Lists ‘Global Obsession’
• One Story To Watch For Every FIDE Candidate
• Who Will Win The Candidates? 7 GMs Offer Their Take
• Sindarov On The Candidates: 'I Know It Will Be Very Hard To Win, But I Want To Try'
• Koneru Humpy Confirms Candidates Withdrawal, Anna Muzychuk Takes Spot
• Meet The 2026 Women's Candidates: Who Should You Root For?
• Meet The 2026 Candidates: Who Should You Root For?
• How To Watch And What You Need To Know About The 2026 FIDE Candidates Tournament
• Caruana-Nakamura In Round 1: FIDE Candidates Pairings Announced