D Gukesh still in hunt for first Superbet win after maiden Classical defeat since becoming World Chess Champion

D Gukesh has just managed four draws besides one loss in his five games thus far, at the ongoing Superbet Classic.

D Gukesh suffered a maiden defeat in the fourth round of the Superbet Classic, losing to Maxime Vachier-Lagrave. The French GM bagged his first win against the reigning World Champion in the Classical format. The pair have met twice in the past in Classical games, with both ending in draws. But on Saturday, Maxime took advantage of a huge position mistake by Gukesh to bag a full point and also hand the 18-year-old his first Classical defeat since becoming World Champion.

Since his World Championship title four months ago, Grandmaster Gukesh is on the hunt for a classical tournament win.(HT_PRINT)

Then on Sunday, Gukesh managed to stage a comeback, drawing to Duda Jan-Krzysztof of Poland. Meanwhile, R Praggnanandhaa has performed better than his Indian counterpart, bagging one win and four draws. He has three points and is in joint-lead with Fabiano Caruana and Maxime.

D Gukesh's hunt for an elusive victory continued in the first half of the event and the youngest ever world champion has just got four draws besides one loss in his five games thus far.

American duo of Levon Aronian and Wesley So, Deac Bogdan Daniel of Romania and Firouzja Alireza of France share the fourth spot on 2.5 points behind the three leaders while Abdusattorov, Duda and Gukesh hold the eighth spot in the 10-players round-robin tournament.

With a 100000 USD at stake as the first prize out of a total prize pool of USD 350000 in the tournament, all eyes will be on Praggnanandhaa especially as after Duda, he will be left with two white games out of the last three rounds when he meets Alireza, Wesley and finally Aronian.

For Gukesh the road to recovery is still long but the Indian has proven time and again his capacity to bounce back from adverse situations. The lone rest day on Monday might give the breather Gukesh needs to start his comeback.

Caruana and Vachier-Lagrave have had similar results like Praggnanandhaa with one win and four draws apiece and both have displayed good form coming into the rest day.

(With PTI inputs)