D Gukesh topped the rapid format, but he had an off day on Day 4 of the Grand Chess Tour as the reigning world champion lost seven out of the nine games in the blitz format.
Gukesh lost the first five games, which also included a defeat to Magnus Carlsen. He later managed to get a draw against Anish Giri, and his first win came against American GM GM Fabiano Caruana. After the poor showing, Gukesh slipped to third position with 15.5 points.
Magnus Carlsen, who suffered a defeat to Gukesh, reacted to the clash and said he was playing old man’s chess, trying to play without any tactics.
“I think the game itself was kind of rubbish. I was really just playing old man’s chess, trying to play without tactics with whoever, but it worked out well, so can’t complain,” he said while speaking to Take Take Take.
Speaking further on Gukesh’s performance on the day, Magnus took a sly dig at the Indian grandmaster and said that his games were not very good.
“Obviously, the score is shocking-and from what I could see, the games weren’t very good either,” Carlsen said of Gukesh’s performance as quoted by TOI.
“The good thing for him is that it could not have gone any worse from him. It’s never easy to have an overnight lead in these tournaments. 4 points over me and 3 over Duda is a lot.
“But it doesn’t feel like that much when you don’t have that experience. So far it’s been poor, but for his sake he can calm down and play with a different attitude tomorrow – because now he doesn’t have anything to lose,” he added.
Carlsen finished in third position in the rapid section but bounced back on Day 4. The Norwegian managed six wins and three draws, and is now on top of the table with 17.5 points.