2026 FIDE Candidates Round 13
We have the next World Championship challenger, but the Women's is still up in the air as Vaishali and Bibisara lead by half a point.
Ponder on this position. We’ll take a look at it at the end of the article.
Giri - Sindarov
First, off; Sindarov played a virtually perfect game as Black to draw Giri for the final half-point he needed to secure the Candidate’s Tournament with a round to spare. From this point on, everybody is playing for second place.
Wei - Esipenko
This game featured a really interesting tactic that could have kept the balance, but the fact that it was delayed by one move meant completely changed the evaluation.
Black is in good shape: castled position, safer king, nice outpost for the knight on e4. Well, it was a nice outpost, but it was just threatened with the move f3.
18…Rac8!?
An interesting piece sacrifice with a tactical point. 19.fxe4? fxe4! wins back a piece with a power attack. Because of this, Esipenko uses this time to put a rook on a good square.
19.h4!
Wei spots the tactic and creates luft for his king.
19…Ndc5?
A second sacrifice, but one that Esipenko should have played one move earlier.
Let’s look at that real quick:
Here Black is fine in all lines, but following a line analogous to game continuation with the move h4 shows us the importance of the move orders:
19.h4 Nxd3 20.Qxd3 and now Black can trade on d2 and is fine in every line.
Back to the game:
Because White was given time to play h4, the following faulty combination by Black leaves Wei up a piece:
20.dxc5 Qxc5 21.Kh2 Qf2 22.Kh3 Qd4 23.Bxe4 fxe4 24.Bg3
It’s incredible what a single tempo (giving White the chance to play h4!) does, and how it can make or break a tactical combination. While Black is still the one attacking, the piece sacrifice is close to running out of steam, and the compensation is lacking. Wei would go on to win a slightly touch-and-go game.
Caruana - Praggnanandhaa
This endgame ended up being a near-miss. Fabi enjoyed an advantage all game, and was able to achieve this position. The material imbalance creates a very sticky strategical situation for both sides. It’s not an easy win — even though Fabi is up an extra point of material, Black has significant counterplay thanks to his centralized passed pawn duo. Additionally, the g3-pawn is a major problem for white, as soon also will be the g2-pawn. Both players burned most of their time to get to this position, so there isn’t a lot of time to think. There is one more move before they reach the time control.
40.Qxe6
In exchange for thirty extra minutes, Fabi has lost the tempo needed to play for a win. After 40.a4! White is threatening Qb5, followed by Qxb6. While the likely outcome would probably still be a draw, White would have cleared the way for his a-pawn to become a pain in Black’s queenside, and this pawn would roll much more quickly than Black’s central passers.
As it was, Pragg played 40…Rcxg3, and after 41.Rf5+ Kc6 42.Rf2 Kc7 43.Rf7+, the players agreed to a draw, as there was nothing left to play for.
Lagno - Divya
An interesting mutual blunder occurred on the 15.5th and 16th move of the game.
Here Divya played the move 15…Be5, making a threat on the b-pawn. Lagno decided to defend it with 16.Qb3, but she had a much better idea available:
16.f4!
But doesn’t this just encourage the bishop to take on b2, which was the idea in the first place? Sure; but White wins a piece after 16…Bxb2 17.Ra2!
and after 16…Bd6, White has 17.c5!, also winning a piece
The spiteful counter threat Bf5 amounts to nothing in either case, because White can simply slide the queen to d2 or b3 while maintaining the unstoppable piece-winning threat.
In any case, Lagno eventually won this game by keeping up the tactical pressure.
Zhu - Goryachkina
This game featured a fascinating blunder by Zhu, but the follow-up by Goryachkina was a nice prophylaxis:
Black’s pawn-minus is counterbalanced by the very advanced a-pawn and the very weak White King position. Black has created a really powerful threat of Qh2+, and White has a few ways to respond. For instance 51.Kg2 bluntly prevents this check directly. Also, the move 51.Ne5 cannot be impeached. Alas, Zhu blocked the queen with a different piece:
51.Re5??
When you thought about this position, what did you think Black should play? Goryachkina very quickly chose a brilliant “waiting” move.
51…Kh8!!
The whole point is to prevent the move c4-c5 from coming with check. Despite the Black king being so far displaced from the attack in question, its sally to h8 is the inaugural battlecry of Black’s position.
52.Ke3?
52.Kg2 was still preferable
52…Bd7 53.Re4
Making room for a defending move; this move underscores why the earlier move to e5 was such a terrible blunder.
53…Bxc6!
More brutal prophylaxis. Black prevents the move Ne5, which would defend the f-pawn.
54.bxc6 Qg3 55.Qf2 Qxg6 56.d5 Qf6 57.Qe2 a2 0-1
White’s queen is overloaded and must give up her rook to stop the pawn (58.Qxa2 Qc3+! 59.Ke2 Qxf3+ 60.Kd2 Qxe4) , so she resigned.
Sindarov becomes the new world champion challenger with a round to spare; but it’s still up in the air for the Women. Bibisara and Vaishali lead with 7.5 each, but Zhu is behind by only a half-point. Muzychuk, Goryachkina, and Lagno could also possibly tie for first. There could be a five-way tie for first place tomorrow. Stranger things have happened, you know.