
Praggnanandhaa Defeats Gukesh In Playoffs, Wins Tata Steel Chess 2025
In the unforgettable round 13 of the 2025 Tata Steel Chess Masters, both leaders lost their last classical games of the tournament. GM Arjun Erigaisi played a perfect game to defeat World Champion Gukesh Dommaraju in 31 moves, while GM Vincent Keymer beat GM Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu in a nearly seven-hour marathon. In the subsequent blitz playoffs, Praggnanandhaa lost the first game against Gukesh but then won twice to win the coveted title.
GM Thai Dai Van Nguyen won the Challengers with 9.5/13 and will be invited to the Masters tournament next year. With the black pieces, he defeated GM Benjamin Bok. GM Aydin Suleymanli, also with Black, also reached the same score after winning vs. IM Irina Bulmaga, but he missed the qualification spot by the Sonneborn-Berger tiebreak.


- Masters: Arjun, Keymer Take Out Both Leaders
- Playoffs: Praggnanandhaa Outlasts Gukesh
- Masters: Abdusattorov Misses Out, Warmerdam Upsets Caruana
- Challengers: Five Decisive Games, Van Nguyen Qualifies Over Suleymanli
Masters: Arjun, Keymer Take Out Both Leaders
The extraordinary round 13 of this year's Tata Steel featured a rare collapse by both leaders, a crisis that somewhat resembles the 2013 Candidates Tournament. There too, leaders GM Magnus Carlsen and GM Vladimir Kramnik lost the last round. Carlsen earned the right to play GM Viswanathan Anand by tiebreaks, without playoffs, in a match he won later that year to become world champion.
12 years ago, the spoilers were GMs Peter Svidler and Vasyl Ivanchuk (and anyone wanting to relive that mayhem can see this video). This year, the architects of disaster were two players from the bottom of the scoreboard. Arjun was on 4.5/12, one point above last-place GM Max Warmerdam, while Keymer was just half a point above that, and yet their efforts made an incalculable difference in Wijk aan Zee.

There were three decisive games in the Masters, with Arjun and Keymer winning against the two leaders. If GM Nodirbek Abdusattorov managed to win, he would have joined the playoffs, but he did not. Warmerdam outplayed none other than the top seed, GM Fabiano Caruana.
That leaves Praggnanandhaa in first after the playoffs, Gukesh in second, and Abdusattorov in third. All three players are 20 years old (in Abdusattorov's case) or younger, and two of them are Indian.
Tata Steel Chess Masters: Round 13 Results
We'll start with the classical games before we discuss about the playoffs.
Gukesh 0-1 Arjun
Arjun won a one-sided game, with 98.8 accuracy the whole way through, according to Chess.com's Game Review. IM Tania Sachdev summarized this game in the context of the full tournament:
How crazy is it that Arjun Erigaisi, who's had the worst tournament of his life, in these last two rounds, he takes down Nodirbek Abdusattorov, who's fighting for the championship, and now putting Gukesh Dommaraju on the ropes here, the world champion.

Arjun hadn't won a game for the first 11 rounds; instead, he lost four times, drew seven, and plummeted over 30 rating points and two spots in the world rankings. Somehow, he found the strength to take down two tournament leaders in the last two rounds.
Arjun boasts a great lifetime record against Gukesh; he's never lost a classical encounter and had won four times previously. Although the game started as a Petroff Defense, it quickly became one of the sharpest games in the playing hall when they castled on opposite sides. Both sides threw pawns forward at the enemy king.
Gukesh's only chance for an advantage in the game was finding the hard-to-believe 14.Bf3!!, just allowing the rook on f1 to be hanging. In return, White would win the d5-pawn with pressure on the long diagonal.
Understandably, Gukesh didn't play it. Arjun noticed the option but said, "I briefly considered it, but I thought I don't even need to take [the rook]," adding that he could play ...h5 instead.
Gukesh's ambition was his downfall, a theme that would haunt him again in the playoffs. He saw the draw starting with 16.Ncxd5 but avoided it, but he really needed to trade queens on move 18 and steer the game to equality. Instead, after he played 18.Rd1?, Arjun was "very happy" with his position. With an attack, he was like a shark in water:
It's a bittersweet ending for Arjun, who found his form in only the last two rounds. He told WIM Fiona Steil-Antoni, "After yesterday's win, I was feeling pretty confident today already," and he leaves the tournament with newfound confidence.
As for what went wrong? It was the start itself. He pointed to game one, where he "should have just traded queens" and the round-four loss against Fedoseev where, from a winning position, he blundered.
He loses 24 points but drops to just number-five in the world. One can imagine worse outcomes, even if Arjun finishes at the bottom of the standings with 5.5/13.
Keymer 1-0 Praggnanandhaa
At virtually the same moment Gukesh lost, Praggnanandhaa made a serious mistake. After 34...Qe7? 35.Qc8, White would in fact have been winning and knocking Praggnanandhaa, just like Gukesh, down to 8.5/13. As fans waited for Keymer's move, everything was possible: would we see tiebreaks with Gukesh, Praggnanandhaa, and even potentially Abdusattorov?
Although Keymer missed the first opportunity, the position was still a nightmare for his opponent to defend. Black would have to watch over the light squares around his king forever with no chance of simplifying the position. The Indian grandmaster told Steil-Antoni, "I don't think practically I had any chance in that position."
The torture would go on for over 40 more moves and many hours, and although his play wasn't perfect, Keymer got the job done. GM Rafael Leitao analyzes the Game of the Day below.
The humor of the situation wasn't lost on Keymer, who said he did think about the fact that he'd been Gukesh's second in the 2024 FIDE World Championship. Defeating Praggnanandhaa, ensuring tiebreaks for his boss, was perhaps an extension of that duty.

Keymer finishes with 6/13 and assessed the tournament as "weird," explaining:
The first few rounds were very shaky, but the results were fine. After that I felt that actually my play was quite decent, but I somehow managed to give away far too many points to one-move blunders... I was quickly losing like three games for no apparent reason.
He has just a few days before he plays his next event, the Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Weissenhaus held in Germany.
As for history in the making, perhaps Sunday's photos will be just as cherished six years from now?
2019 vs 2025
— Tata Steel Chess Tournament (@tatasteelchess) February 2, 2025
Praggnanandhaa H - Vincent Keymer!👇 pic.twitter.com/HQbkOCfh9y
Playoffs: Praggnanandhaa Outlasts Gukesh
About half an hour after Keymer won that game, we had blitz playoffs. Two games were played first, and when there was an equal score, the first to win took it all. Notably, in the sudden death White had just 2:30 minutes against 3:00 (plus a two-second increment).
Gukesh had narrowly avoided tiebreaks in the 2024 FIDE Candidates Tournament and the 2024 world championship, but not in his first event after becoming world champion.
Gukesh won game one, but Praggnanandhaa won on demand and then struck again to claim the 2025 title.
Gukesh warmed up with Puzzle Rush on Chess.com, which paid off in the first game.
Gukesh played 3 minute Puzzle Rush in his time before the tiebreaks 🧩 pic.twitter.com/bGG0I3pcXX
— Chess.com (@chesscom) February 2, 2025
The world champion adopted one of the openings that GM Ding Liren had used against him in the world championship match. A more-or-less even game was coming to a peaceful end when Praggnanandhaa first decided not to play 34...Qxc4, essentially forcing the draw, and a move later blundered with 35...Qd6??.
In game two, Praggnanandhaa played the Trompowsky. His attack took clear shape after 23.e5 and became decisive after 24.Ng4 Kh8? 25.Nc4. He reached a pawn-up endgame and ultimately won by skewering two knights.
It was Praggnanandhaa's turn to take a page out of Ding's repertoire in game three as he repeated the former world champion's attempt in the London System. But the result of the game, and thus the match, had nothing to do with the opening.
At first, Gukesh reached a pawn-up endgame, but when he failed to find the winning 30...Bd6! Praggnanandhaa won his pawn back. They had a dead-equal position, knight and three pawns vs. knight and three pawns, in which Gukesh tried so hard to win that he ultimately, low on time, managed to lose with a painful blunder.

You can watch the clip of the final game, with commentary, below.
In the interview, Praggnanandhaa said it was the most stressful day of his career, comparing it only to a previous tiebreak he played against Arjun (perhaps referring to the 2023 FIDE World Cup). "I'm still shaking," he told Steil-Antoni, "it was such a crazy game."
He didn't expect to win the last game, of course, and said he hadn't really thought about winning the event until the night before: "When I came here, I wanted to win the event, but the field is very strong." Mom believes in him, though!

He also quipped, "I should probably buy something for Arjun!"
I should probably buy something for Arjun!
—Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu
You can also check out GM Hikaru Nakamura's recap of the match below.
Masters: Abdusattorov Misses Out, Warmerdam Upsets Caruana
Abdusattorov ½-½ Harikrishna
Things didn't go smoothly for any of the leaders, but Abdusattorov never got a second chance. It's three near-misses for Abdusattorov in three years at Tata Steel Chess. He has led the tournaments since 2023 only to have meltdowns in the final stretch.
In an interview, GM Peter Leko listed just how many things went wrong for the Uzbek GM:
I feel very bad for Nodirbek because if you look back, in the very first round, he had a fantastic game against Pragg, he didn't manage to win. He was very close to grounding down Gukesh in a very good game and also against Vincent. So basically three very good games he should have won.
And then, because of these missed opportunities, he overpressed against Arjun in round 12 and lost, Leko said.
Had Abdusattorov beaten GM Pentala Harikrishna on demand, we would have seen him in tiebreaks, but it wasn't meant to be. Although the players achieved a complicated middlegame position, Harikrishna was up to the task of holding the balance, and no one can win a game without help from their opponent.
It's still a solid performance and Abdusattorov finishes third, gains seven points, and keeps his world number-six spot. Harikrishna finishes seventh and gains six points.
Caruana 0-1 Warmerdam
In the first month of the year, Warmerdam (rated 2646 in this event) has already had three run-ins with 2800+ players. As Tata Steel Chess pointed out, he has won the majority of those games!
What is happening?! @max_warmerdam beats world #3 Fabiano Caruana with the black pieces! The Dutchman now has a 66,7% win rate against 2800+ players 🔥.
— Tata Steel Chess Tournament (@tatasteelchess) February 2, 2025
⛔️ vs Magnus Carlsen (German Bundesliga)
✅ vs Erigaisi (Tata Steel Masters R7)
✅ vs Fabiano Caruana (Tata Steel Masters R13)… pic.twitter.com/cfpxKluoUO
Warmerdam, who said he's not a chess professional as he's still in a university and studying economics, shared a little anecdote:
After I beat Arjun, I also made some joke to my friends that you just kind of know that for the rest of my career that's going to be my best victory. And then I also made some joke, okay, Fabi is still coming!
In fact for this game, he made a sizeable change in his routine, something he's never done before. "Half an hour before the game, I took quite a lot of caffeine, to kind of be sure, and it seems to have paid off!"
Half an hour before the game, I took quite a lot of caffeine... and it seems to have paid off!
—Max Warmerdam
The moment he felt the tide turn was at 17.Bd4 Ne4, saying, "I think he underestimated my ...Ne4. Suddenly he started to tank, which was nice to see." As Warmerdam pushed his queenside majority, Caruana didn't develop an appropriate plan and ultimately started to drift. By the time they neared the time control, the American, with little time, collapsed. The Dutchman received another 50 minutes to mop up:
Warmerdam finishes in last place on 4.5/13, but he leaves with two career-best wins on home soil. Caruana finishes in eighth, loses 20 points, and drops down to world number-four. Gukesh has overtaken him on the live rating list.

GM Jorden van Foreest, in a Berlin endgame against GM Anish Giri, achieved a better, and at one point winning, position, but the Dutch number-one escaped with a draw. It's a second missed chance in a row for Van Foreest, who nearly show-stopped Gukesh in the previous round. Giri finishes with 7/13, gaining a modest five rating points, while Van Foreest finishes without a win at 5.5/13 and loses just two points.

GM Wei Yi neutralized GM Vladimir Fedoseev's main-line Catalan Opening, and neither player had a chance for more than the draw. Although it's a downgrade from winning the tournament last year, Wei stays at the same rating with his 7/13 undefeated finish. And Fedoseev finishes fourth with an 11-point gain.

GM Alexey Sarana found a creative pawn sacrifice and outplayed GM Leon Mendonca, but he failed to find the only winning move, 25.Ng3!. Just like that, all chances evaporated and the players traded into a drawn queen endgame.

Mendonca finishes second to last at 5/13 but gains a rating point, while Sarana stays at the same rating with 5.5/13.

Challengers: Five Decisive Games, Van Nguyen Qualifies Over Suleymanli
If there's something we didn't see too much of in the Challengers, it's draws. There were another five decisive games in round 13. GM Vaishali Rameshbabu, Van Nguyen, GM Kazybek Nogerbek, Suleymanli, and GM Nodirbek Yakubboev all scored in the final dash.
Tata Steel Chess Challengers: Round 13 Results
Van Nguyen finished first, Suleymanli second by tiebreaks, and GM Erwin L'Ami third even despite his loss.
Tata Steel Chess Challengers: Standings After Round 13
Van Nguyen had been thinking about this round since two days before, saying he almost couldn't sleep after round 12. "I knew that today I had to win to even have a chance. I didn't calculate any tiebreaks yet.
He acknowledged that defeating Bok with the black pieces is a tall order, and he knew he was worse in the queenless middlegame. "Today I wanted to imbalance the position a lot and I got myself in a bit of trouble, but he was very low on time." Bok was better, but trading 27.Bxb3 allowed equality, after which Van Nguyen sacrificed two pawns just to complicate matters.
I got myself in a bit of trouble, but he was very low on time
—Thai Dai Van Nguyen
Bok, who sacrificed two pawns in return, was playing solely on the increment starting on move 33, and although his position was equal, it required accuracy. 41.d5! was a necessary pawn sacrifice for Bok to defend, but that turned out to be too difficult to find and Van Nguyen was rewarded for his bravery.
"It feels absolutely amazing," said Van Nguyen about what is his best career win. "I tried three years ago and I finished second, and this year finally I managed to win, which was really difficult" after losing to GM Frederik Svane in round 11, he said. As for playing in the Masters in 2026, the 24-year-old beamed: "It will be the biggest opportunity so far in my career."
It will be the biggest opportunity so far in my career.
—Thai Dai Van Nguyen
For Bok, it was just his second loss in the 13 rounds. He won five games and drew six to finish on 8/13 and still goes up 8.2 points.
Meanwhile, Suleymanli outplayed Bulmaga from the black side of a Sicilian to finish on 9.5/13. The first tiebreak was direct encounter—he drew his game against Van Nguyen, so that's a dud—and the second was the Sonneborn-Berger. Not qualifying for the Masters is a tough pill to swallow, after he'd won four games in a row at the end of the tournament.

Bulmaga will be happy to go back home, after finishing in last with 1/13—two draws and 11 losses.
It will be another tough pill to swallow for L'Ami, who would have finished with 9.5 points if he won on demand, for a chance to qualify for the Masters. Last year, the Dutch GM tasted early success as he led the tournament until his loss in round six and ultimately finished fourth-fifth.
He lost his last round this year against Vaishali.

Vaishali, who lost her last three games, would naturally have been a target. But one thing we learned from the 2024 FIDE Women's Candidates Tournament is that you should never count her out. There, she lost four games in a row only to bounce back with five consecutive wins.
She played a splendidly one-sided positional game against L'Ami in the Sicilian Moscow Variation, only briefly losing control before the move-40 mark when she was playing with under a minute (and giving one last chance, which was missed, on move 43).
With her ninth-place finish (6/13) in a strong field, she nevertheless gains 8.1 points with a 2523 rating performance.

Yakubboev finished strong with a black win after IM Lu Miaoyi made an unsound knight sacrifice in a Sicilian. He took the piece and won his third consecutive game to finish in fourth-fifth with Bok. Lu finished a half-point behind Vaishali but gained 11.2 and great experience at the age of 14.

The youngest prodigy in the group, IM Faustino Oro, lost his sixth game in the last seven, against Nogerbek. The Kazakh GM squeezed an isolated-pawn position for a long time, but even when he won the pawn, Oro had compensation. The young Argentinian was unable to hold the difficult endgame through to the end.

Of the four players who drew in round 13, 16-year-old Turkish IM Ediz Gurel (who drew Svane) finished highest in the tournament, on 7.5/13. He actually had zero losses in the second half, and his 4.1-point rating loss can be attributed more to three losses in the first half. He still, with grace, gave the fans what they wanted:

Perhaps the most straightforward draw was IM Arthur Pijpers vs. Divya Deshmukh. The former gains 3.6 points with a 5.5/13 score, while Divya will have to hit the lab, reflect, and come back stronger. She finishes second to last on 3.5/13, losing 20 points.
On a final note, FM Panesar Vedant won the Qualifiers to enter the Challengers group next year. Till then, tot ziens (bye-bye)!

How To Review
The 87th edition of Tata Steel Chess took place January 18-February 2, 2025, in Wijk aan Zee, the Netherlands. The time control was 100 minutes for 40 moves followed by 50 minutes to finish each game, with a 30-second increment from move one. Both the Masters and Challengers groups were 14-player round-robin tournaments.
Previous coverage:
- Round 12: Gukesh, Praggnanandhaa Lead; Arjun Takes Down Abdusattorov
- Round 11: Praggnanandhaa Climbs, Abdusattorov Misses, Gukesh Still Leads
- Round 10: Gukesh Scores 5th Win; Abdusattorov, Praggnanandhaa In Hot Pursuit
- Round 9: Gukesh Breaks Clear; Fedoseev, Giri Also Win
- Round 8: Caruana, Wei Yi Join Tata Steel Chess Title Race
- Round 7: Gukesh Catches Leaders; Arjun Suffers 4th Loss
- Round 6: Gukesh Pulls Off Great Escape Against Abdusattorov
- Round 5: Fedoseev Beats Caruana; Abdusattorov, Gukesh Also Win Before Showdown
- Round 4: Praggnanandhaa Leads After 3rd Straight Win; Heartbreak For Arjun
- Round 3: Pragg Beats Arjun, Leads With Abdusattorov—7/7 For White In Challengers
- Round 2: Caruana, Abdusattorov, Praggnanandhaa Win To Join Leaders
- Round 1: Gukesh Beats Giri In Thriller As Tata Steel Chess Starts With A Bang
- Tata Steel Chess 2025: 7 Talking Points