Truly "a wonder!" Praggnanandhaa scores his first GM norm

by Sagar Shah - 22/11/2017

The world was waiting with a bated breath. Praggnanandhaa moved his knight to c6. The little American GM Awonder Liang saw no way to stave off mate and stretched his hand out in resignation! Little Praggu had done it! The boy has scored his maiden GM norm! But there is no time to relax. With 6.5/8 Pragg is in a great position to win the World Juniors title. All that he has to do is beat Norwegian Aryan Tari, who is in the lead, in the ninth round! It's going to be a fascinating finish. We bring you all the action from the eighth round with video analysis by IM Sagar Shah.

Praggnanandhaa scores his maiden GM norm

There was a collective sigh of relief from the entire Indian chess playing population. Praggnanandhaa made his first GM norm! The boy had achieved his IM title one and a half years ago. Every time he would come close to making a GM norm, he would falter. The time to overtake Karjakin's world record of becoming the youngest GM in the world was running out. But Pragg finally delivered and he delivered in style! With a rating performance of 2749, he achieved his GM norm with one round to spare. Mind you, you only need a performance of 2600 to make a GM norm! The first person to tweet about Pragg's GM norm was coach R.B. Ramesh.

First GM norm for Praggnanandhaa! So it begins...
— Ramesh RB (@Rameshchess) November 21, 2017

Pragg's performance at the World Juniors after eight rounds

Praggnanandhaa vs Awonder Liang

Pragg vs Liang in the match of millennials which took place earlier this year | Photo: Lennart Ootes

Awonder Liang is a very strong opponent. Definitely one of the most talented players in the world. He became a GM at the age of 14 years, second youngest in America (after Sevian) and eleventh youngest in the history of chess. With a rating of 2548, Pragg faced a tough challenge in round eight. But the boy from Chennai had absolutely no problems in overcoming his opponent. As early as 10th move he got a nearly winning position!

The move a4! was extremely strong. The play in the opening revolved around trapping the bishop on b6 and winning the pawn on b7.

Very soon we reached a completely normal position with Black missing a pawn!

The rest was not really a problem for Pragg as he made one strong move after another and soon reached a position where his opponent could have resigned:

Ne5 in this position would have ended the game, as then Black has to give up the rook to stop the pawn from queening. Pragg played b7 when after Nc6 he won the knight

The technical part of the game was not easy. This position requires quite a bit of effort to convert it into a full point. Even though the road was not smooth Pragg reached his destination! And made his maiden GM norm!

One down, two more to go! Or shall we say, three more rounds to go?!! Everyone is hoping that Pragg takes the short cut of winning the World Juniors and becoming a grandmaster!

Video analysis of Pragg's victory:

IM Sagar Shah analyzes Pragg's victory over Awonder Liang!

Karthikeyan's masterpiece!

While major focus has been on Pragg, Karthikeyan Murali played a phenomenal attack against Shardul Gagare to move to 6.0/8. Karthi sacrificed a rook, and broke through to mate Black's king. This is a game worth watching and learning from:

You cannot keep the two-time National Champion quiet for long!

Round 8 results:

Bo.	No.		Name	Rtg	Pts.	Result	Pts.		Name	Rtg	No.
1	2	GM	Oparin Grigoriy	2606	5½	0 - 1	6	GM	Tari Aryan	2581	5
2	44	IM	Dragnev Valentin	2461	5½	0 - 1	5½	GM	Alekseenko Kirill	2563	11
3	26	IM	Praggnanandhaa R	2509	5½	1 - 0	5½	GM	Liang Awonder	2558	14
4	32	FM	Sorokin Aleksey	2483	5½	½ - ½	5½	IM	Xu Xiangyu	2543	21
5	22	GM	Tran Tuan Minh	2538	5½	½ - ½	5½	IM	Lomasov Semen	2490	30
6	6	GM	Karthikeyan Murali	2578	5	1 - 0	5	GM	Gagare Shardul	2482	33
7	28	IM	Triapishko Alexandr	2508	5	½ - ½	5	GM	Aravindh Chithambaram Vr.	2572	7
8	16	GM	Petrosyan Manuel	2554	5	1 - 0	5	IM	Gholami Aryan	2483	31
9	37	IM	Zanan Evgeny	2471	5	0 - 1	5	GM	Bai Jinshi	2553	17
10	18	GM	Shevchenko Kirill	2550	5	½ - ½	5	GM	Salomon Johan	2476	35

Rank after Round 8

Rk.	SNo		Name	FED	Rtg	Pts.	TB1	TB2	TB3	TB4	TB5	Rp	w	we	w-we	K	rtg+/-
1	5	GM	Tari Aryan	NOR	2581	7,0	0,0	36,0	40,0	4	6,0	2825	7	4,98	2,02	10	20,2
2	11	GM	Alekseenko Kirill	RUS	2563	6,5	0,5	39,0	43,0	4	6,0	2718	6,5	5,03	1,47	10	14,7
3	26	IM	Praggnanandhaa R	IND	2509	6,5	0,5	37,5	41,0	4	5,0	2749	6,5	4,09	2,41	10	24,1
4	30	IM	Lomasov Semen	RUS	2490	6,0	0,0	39,0	43,0	4	4,0	2690	6	3,89	2,11	10	21,1
5	21	IM	Xu Xiangyu	CHN	2543	6,0	0,0	37,5	41,5	4	4,0	2634	6	5,08	0,92	10	9,2
6	6	GM	Karthikeyan Murali	IND	2578	6,0	0,0	36,5	40,5	4	5,0	2663	6	5,16	0,84	10	8,4
7	56	FM	Liu Yan	CHN	2422	6,0	0,0	36,5	39,0	4	4,0	2689	6	3,13	2,87	10	28,7
8	32	FM	Sorokin Aleksey	RUS	2483	6,0	0,0	34,5	37,5	4	5,0	2673	6	4,00	2,00	10	20,0
9	16	GM	Petrosyan Manuel	ARM	2554	6,0	0,0	34,0	38,0	4	5,0	2623	6	5,33	0,67	10	6,7
	17	GM	Bai Jinshi	CHN	2553	6,0	0,0	34,0	38,0	4	5,0	2621	6	5,33	0,67	10	6,7

Pairings for round 9:

Round 9 on 2017/11/22 at 15:00

Bo.	No.		Name	Rtg	Pts.	Result	Pts.		Name	Rtg	No.
1	5	GM	Tari Aryan	2581	7		6½	IM	Praggnanandhaa R	2509	26
2	11	GM	Alekseenko Kirill	2563	6½		6	GM	Karthikeyan Murali	2578	6
3	30	IM	Lomasov Semen	2490	6		6	GM	Petrosyan Manuel	2554	16
4	17	GM	Bai Jinshi	2553	6		6	GM	Tran Tuan Minh	2538	22
5	21	IM	Xu Xiangyu	2543	6		6	FM	Liu Yan	2422	56
6	1	GM	Van Foreest Jorden	2616	5½		6	FM	Sorokin Aleksey	2483	32
7	24	IM	Kantor Gergely	2514	5½		5½	GM	Oparin Grigoriy	2606	2
8	3	GM	Svane Rasmus	2587	5½		5½	IM	Triapishko Alexandr	2508	28
9	7	GM	Aravindh Chithambaram Vr.	2572	5½		5½	IM	Dragnev Valentin	2461	44
10	35	GM	Salomon Johan	2476	5½		5½	GM	Martirosyan Haik M.	2561	12

World Junior Girls

Two Indian girls have a great chance of winning a medal. They are Aakanksha Hagawane and R. Vaishali.

Rk.	SNo		Name	FED	Rtg	Pts.	TB1	TB2	TB3	TB4	TB5	n	w	we	w-we	K	rtg+/-
1	44	WGM	Paramzina Anastasya	RUS	2123	6,5	1,0	36,0	36,5	4	5,0	8	6,5	2,64	3,86	20	77,2
2	1	IM	Abdumalik Zhansaya	KAZ	2428	6,5	0,0	37,0	40,5	4	6,0	8	6,5	5,51	0,99	10	9,9
3	10	IM	Osmak Iulija	UKR	2345	6,0	0,0	38,5	43,0	4	4,0	8	6	4,80	1,20	10	12,0
4	13	FM	Yu Jennifer	USA	2321	6,0	0,0	35,0	38,0	4	4,0	8	6	4,72	1,28	20	25,6
5	14	WIM	Obolentseva Alexandra	RUS	2320	6,0	0,0	34,0	37,0	4	6,0	8	6	4,36	1,64	20	32,8
6	11	WGM	Tsolakidou Stavroula	GRE	2340	6,0	0,0	32,5	35,5	4	5,0	8	6	4,89	1,11	20	22,2
7	16	WGM	Tokhirjonova Gulrukhbegim	UZB	2306	6,0	0,0	32,5	35,5	4	4,0	8	6	5,74	0,26	20	5,2
8	15	WIM	Aakanksha Hagawane	IND	2312	5,5	0,0	37,5	41,0	4	3,0	8	5,5	4,48	1,02	20	20,4
9	8	IM	Nomin-Erdene Davaademberel	MGL	2358	5,5	0,0	37,5	41,0	3	5,0	7	4,5	4,02	0,48	10	4,8
10	12	WIM	Vaishali R	IND	2325	5,5	0,0	36,5	40,5	4	4,0	8	5,5	5,08	0,42	20	8,4

Can Vaishali make it to the podium! Perhaps it would be the first time that a brother-sister duo would be winning medals at the World Juniors

The golden girl of India! Can Aakanksha put her foot on the accelerator in the last three rounds and make it to the podium?

We are very sure that you have all seen the ChessBase India show that was conducted by IM Sagar Shah when he went to Praggnanandhaa's place in Chennai. However, in case you have missed it, here's your chance to see Pragg in action. How does the boy calculate, what does he think and how is he able to find his way through the maze of complications so easily:

Previous Reports on World Junior Championship

Coverage in English

World Juniors 01: Event opens with early shocks

World Junior 02: Four on a perfect score

World Junior 03: Only one Indian remains at the top

Praggnanandhaa stuns top seed Jorden van Foreest at the World Juniors

World Juniors 04: Harsha Bharathakoti loses his lead

World Junior 05: Chennai champs win the day!

World Junior 06+07: Just past the half way mark Pragg is joint second

Coverage in Hindi

विश्व जूनियर चैंपियनशिप :भारत की युवा उम्मीद !!

विश्व जूनियर चैंपियनशिप 2017 - अभी तो ये आरंभ ह ै !

विश्व जूनियर - क्या प्रग्गानंधा जीत सकते थे ?

Coverage on Firstpost

World Juniors: Harsha Bharathakoti quickly off the mark, Aravindh Chithambaram suffers shock defeat

World Juniors: 12-year-old R Praggnanandhaa chases youngest Grand Master dream, throws tournament wide ope