Hamburg, Feb 11: World champion D Gukesh played out a hard-fought draw with Hikaru Nakamura of United States in the first game of the 5-8 place play-offs in the Freestyle Grand Slam chess here on Tuesday.
After losing the semifinal against American Fabiano Caruana 0-2, Gukesh was back to his confident self against Nakamura who is known for his expertise in this version.
On a day when Magnus Carlsen, the main protagonist behind the tour, lost to young Vincent Keymer, Caruana split the point with Uzbekistan’s Javokhir Sindarov.
In the other game of the day, Nodirbek Abdusattorov of Uzbekistan signed truce with Alireza Firouzja of France.
Gukesh needed a break and he achieved it, matching Nakamura move for move right till the end of the game. The American, in fact, was offensive right from the word go as he pushed his pawns to gain some grip on the position.
Gukesh, however, found the path to equality easily and reached a rook and pawns endgame that was theoretically drawn. Known for his no draw approach, this was Gukesh’s eighth draw in the tournament with the first seven happening in the nine-round prelims. (PTI)
