Praggnanandhaa or Aravindh - Who will win 6th Stepan Avagyan Memorial?

by Shahid Ahmed - 06/06/2025

Aravindh Chithambaram scored an emphatic victory against Benjamin Gledura (HUN) in Round 8 of 6th Stepan Avagyan Memorial. Gledura could not handle an isolated queen's pawn correctly and quickly arrived at a lost knight endgame. R Praggnanandhaa drew with Xiangyu Xu (CHN) in 18 moves. Both Praggnanandhaa and Aravindh are at 5.5/8 each. They are at a full point ahead of Dmitrij Kollars (GER). If both coleaders, draw or win, they will finish top two and tie-breaks will come to play to determine the champion. In a worst case scenario if both of them lose and Kollars wins then three players can end up with the same score. Round 9 starts today at 11 a.m. local time, 12:30 p.m. IST. Photo: Chess Academy of Armenia

Aravindh scores his third win

Aravindh Chithambaram defeated Benjamin Gledura (HUN) to get back in the title fray | Photo: Chess Academy of Armenia

Aravindh - Gledura: 1-0

Aravindh Chithambaram (2749) played two Classical rated games against Benjamin Gledura (HUN, 2668) in 2015 and 2018. Both ended in draws. Aravindh has gotten a lot stronger since then.

Position after 21...Qa6?

Black did not handle the isolated queen's pawn correctly. 21...Qa6? 22.a3 Rd5 23.Nxd4 Rad8 24.Nc6 Rxd3 25.Nxd8 Nf4 26.Rxd3 Nxd3 soon the game liquidated into a knight endgame. Aravindh converted his advantage into a win comfortably. This win put him back in the lead and also in the mix for the first place.

R Praggnanandhaa had an 18-move draw against Xiangyu Xu (CHN) | Photo: Chess Academy of Armenia

Aram Hakobyan (ARM) and Robert Hovhannisyan (ARM) had a hard-fought draw | Photo: Chess Academy of Armenia

Jonas Buhl Bjerre (DEN) - Dmitrij Kollars (GER): 0.5-0.5 | Photo: Chess Academy of Armenia

Samuel Sevian (USA) - Nodirbek Yakubboev (UZB): 0.5-0.5 | Photo: Chess Academy of Armenia

Replay live stream

Replay Round 8 live commentary by IM Lilit Mkrtchian (ARM) and GM Harshit Raja | Video: ChessBase India

Time Control

90 minutes for the first 40 moves + 30 minutes for the rest of the game (with 30 seconds increment starting from move one).

Prizes

The total prize fund is 7450000 AMD (≈ US$ 19325). The top three prizes are 3100000 AMD (≈ US$ 8041), 1 850 000 AMD (≈ US$ 4799) and 1500000 (≈ US$ 3891).

Round 8 results

Bo.	No.	Rtg		White	Result		Black	Rtg	No.
1	10	2623	GM	Xu Xiangyu	½ - ½	GM	Praggnanandhaa R	2758	9
2	1	2635	GM	Hovhannisyan Robert	½ - ½	GM	Hakobyan Aram	2620	8
3	2	2749	GM	Aravindh Chithambaram Vr.	1 - 0	GM	Gledura Benjamin	2663	7
4	3	2641	GM	Bjerre Jonas Buhl	½ - ½	GM	Kollars Dmitrij	2625	6
5	4	2694	GM	Sevian Samuel	½ - ½	GM	Yakubboev Nodirbek	2665	5

Details

Standings after Round 8

Rk.	SNo		Name	FED	Rtg	Pts.	TB1	TB2
1	9	GM	Praggnanandhaa R	IND	2758	5,5	20,25	5
2	2	GM	Aravindh Chithambaram Vr.	IND	2749	5,5	20,00	3
3	6	GM	Kollars Dmitrij	GER	2625	4,5	16,75	5
4	3	GM	Bjerre Jonas Buhl	DEN	2641	4	16,00	3
5	4	GM	Sevian Samuel	USA	2694	4	15,75	3
6	8	GM	Hakobyan Aram	ARM	2620	4	14,25	5
7	5	GM	Yakubboev Nodirbek	UZB	2665	3,5	13,50	4
	10	GM	Xu Xiangyu	CHN	2623	3,5	13,50	4
9	1	GM	Hovhannisyan Robert	ARM	2635	3,5	13,00	3
10	7	GM	Gledura Benjamin	HUN	2663	2	7,50	5

Details

Round 9 pairings

Bo.	No.	Rtg		White	Result		Black	Rtg	No.
1	5	2665	GM	Yakubboev Nodirbek		GM	Xu Xiangyu	2623	10
2	6	2625	GM	Kollars Dmitrij		GM	Sevian Samuel	2694	4
3	7	2663	GM	Gledura Benjamin		GM	Bjerre Jonas Buhl	2641	3
4	8	2620	GM	Hakobyan Aram		GM	Aravindh Chithambaram Vr.	2749	2
5	9	2758	GM	Praggnanandhaa R		GM	Hovhannisyan Robert	2635	1

Details

Schedule

Wednesday	28 May at 19:00	Opening Ceremony
Thursday	29 May at 15:00	Round 1
Friday	30 May at 15:00	Round 2
Saturday	31 May at 15:00	Round 3
Sunday	1 June at 15:00	Round 4
Monday	2 June at 15:00	Round 5
Tuesday	3 June at 15:00	Round 6
Wednesday	4 June at 15:00	Round 7
Thursday	5 June at 15:00	Round 8
Friday	6 June at 11:00	Round 9
Friday	6 June at 18:00	Closing Ceremony