Viswanathan Anand suggests Gukesh D ‘enjoy the moment’ after FIDE Candidates win, says ‘I’m personally very proud’
Viswanathan Anand congratulated Gukesh D on his FIDE Candidates 2024 win and expressed that he “personally” felt proud of his achievement.
India’s Gukesh D won the FIDE Candidates in Toronto on Sunday with a score of 9/14. With this, the 17-year-old chess player became the first teenager to win the tournament. Not only that, he also became the youngest World Championship challenger and only the second Indian, after Viswanathan Anand, to secure the Candidates title.
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After Gukesh D won the tournament and made India proud, former five-time world chess champion Viswanathan Anand congratulated the chess grandmaster and expressed that he “personally” felt proud of his achievement.
Anand took to X and congratulated the chess prodigy, “Congratulations to Gukesh D for becoming the youngest challenger.”
He added, “The Waca Chess family is so proud of what you have done. I’m personally very proud of how you played and handled tough situations.”
The 54-year-old also shared an advice for the young chess player. He said, “Enjoy the moment.”
After winning the tournament, Gukesh said, “Right now, I am so relieved and so happy. I was following this crazy game (Caruana vs Nepomniachtchi), and I was completely emotional, but now, after the game finished, I’m feeling quite good.”
He added, “It was really nice to see all the people here supporting me and cheering for chess. I usually don’t try to interact with the outside world a lot during the tournament, but surely, whenever they cheered during and after the games, it was really nice to see that. Their support means a lot to me.”
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Gukesh also said that he was in the “right mindset” throughout the tournament and that it played a pivotal role in his win. “The main thing was that I was in the right mindset throughout the event. From start to end, I was in good spirits, and fully motivated, and I really wanted to win the event. All these things come together. It was helpful that I was sharp chess-wise and I managed to play some good chess but I would say mainly my mental attitude in this tournament was very very good.”
He further expressed, “It’s always an honour representing my country. To achieve something big for myself and my country is very special to me.”