Three-way tie sets up explosive final round at FIDE WGP Monaco
The penultimate round of the FIDE Women’s Grand Prix in Monaco delivered a dramatic spectacle, with four out of five games ending decisively. Goryachkina, Tan, Munguntuul, and Harika all scored victories, setting the stage for a thrilling final round. Three players now share the tournament lead, ensuring an exciting finish. On a lighter note, Bibisara Assaubayeva celebrated her 21st birthday today, receiving chocolates and flowers from the organizers as a thoughtful gift before her game. Virginie Cotta, the General Secretary of Société des Bains de Mer, made the ceremonial first move on her board. Also present today was the Berezovsky chess family—mother Svetlana and daughter Fiorina—who represented Monaco at the FIDE Olympiad last year. It was a pleasure to catch up with them at the event. As the tournament nears its conclusion, fatigue is naturally setting in. Some players opted to conserve their energy, while others fought fiercely for every point. As always, the round featured high-level chess and intense battles across the boards. Round 8 results: Aleksandra Goryachkina 1-0 Sarasadat KhademalshariehKateryna Lagno 1/2-1/2 Humpy KoneruBibisara Assaubayeva 0-1 Zhongyi TanHarika Dronavalli 1-0 Alexandra KosteniukElisabeth Paehtz 0-1 Batkhuyag Munguntuul Aleksandra Goryachkina – Sarasadat Khademalsharieh As often happens towards the end of a tournament, fatigue took its toll on Khadem, who suffered her third consecutive loss. Sarasadat played somewhat passively again, though she still sought to create counterplay, staying true to her fighting spirit. Goryachkina, however, capitalized on her opponent’s weaknesses and demonstrated her trademark consistency, even in the latter stages of the event. Emerging from a closed Ruy Lopez, the game was slow and positional—an environment in which Goryachkina has thrived throughout the tournament. White built up a comfortable position and gradually improved her pieces as Black struggled to generate play. Khadem’s game unraveled as she allowed unnecessary activity, dropped a pawn without compensation, and overlooked tactical nuances, ultimately ceding full control. In a completely lost position, she resigned on move 50. With this victory, Goryachkina joins Lagno and Munguntuul in the lead, setting up a high-stakes final-round encounter against the latter. Kateryna Lagno – Humpy Koneru After a grueling six-hour battle against Zhongyi Tan in the previous round, Lagno opted for a quick draw against Humpy Koneru. Leading the standings by half a point, with Koneru trailing just behind, the decision was pragmatic as she looks to maintain her position heading into the final round. Bibisara Assaubayeva – Tan Zhongyi Unfortunately for Assaubayeva, Tan had no birthday presents to offer over the board. Playing a closed Ruy Lopez, White made a few questionable decisions, allowing Black to dictate the pace of the game. Despite occasional chances to escape, Assaubayeva remained on the back foot, and Tan secured a commanding advantage. The game reached a critical moment after 37…Nxg2, where White’s best option was the dynamic 38.Qxg2 f4 39.Rxe5 Rxe5 40.Rxe5 Rxg3, followed by sacrificing the queen with 41.Rxd5. This would have given White practical chances in a queen vs. rook-and-knight endgame. Instead, White captured on e5 immediately, allowing 38…Nxe1, after which the position was completely lost. The game concluded with 39.Rxd5 Kg8 40.Nxf5 Qa8—Black’s queen attacking the rook and the threat 41…Qa2+ sealed White’s fate. Harika Dronavalli – Alexandra Kosteniuk Dronavalli has steadily regained confidence after her rocky start, and today she finally notched her first win of the event. The game, a King’s Indian Attack with both sides fianchettoing on the kingside, quickly turned sharp as White aggressively advanced on the queenside. The players reached a middlegame with opposite-colored bishops, where White had a far-advanced but isolated c-pawn. Kosteniuk faced an important decision here. A retreat with 25…Bb6 was the safer choice, but she opted for the more natural 25…e5, which, while seemingly strengthening the bishop, but slightly exposed her king exposed. The situation worsened for Black after the pseudo-active 26…f5, opening position even more. A decisive moment came when Kosteniuk moved her king forward 28…Kf6? only to retreat immediately after 29.Bd5 Kg7. Again after the reserved 29…Bb6 Black would have been just slightly worse. Not only did this misstep cost Alexandra a couple of tempi, but she also spent 10 minutes deliberating over the move, leaving herself in time trouble. As played, Dronavalli seized the moment with the spectacular 30.Rxd4!, a thematic sacrifice exploiting Black’s open king. White continued with precise play, dismantling Black’s kingside defenses and clinching a much-needed victory. Elisabeth Paehtz – Batkhuyag Munguntuul This was undoubtedly the game of the round, as underdog Munguntuul struck at a crucial moment to join the leaders. The game, a Semi-Slav, quickly veered off mainline theory, and Paehtz initially seemed to have the upper hand with an active position and a dominant outpost knight on d6. The tide shifted when Paehtz played 27.Ne4 (27.Rd1 was a more natural and stronger option), allowing Black’s rook to establish itself on d5, equalizing. After 28.a5 Munguntuul upset the balance with an interesting practical sacrifice 28…Bxe5! The engines may not fully agree with this move but it presented White with some problems. Paehtz’s biggest mistake came here. White needed to play 33.Rg1 to ensure back-rank safety, but instead, she played 33.Re1? allowing 33…Qc3! After 34.Qxc3 bxc3 35.Rec1 c2 36.h3, it was too late, and 36…Rd1 sealed her fate. Though Paehtz briefly created counterplay with a passed a-pawn, Munguntuul remained composed, converting her kingside pawn two-pawn advantage into a well-earned victory. This incredible performance places her among the tournament leaders—an impressive feat in what is shaping up to be the best event of her career. With three players—Lagno, Goryachkina, and Munguntuul—now sharing the lead, the final round of the FIDE Women’s Grand Prix in Monte-Carlo promises a dramatic showdown. Don’t miss the action—tune in for the final round and witness history unfold! Standings after Round 8: Kateryna Lagno – 5Batkhuyag Munguntuul – 5Aleksandra Goryachkina – 5Humpy Koneru – 4.5Tan Zhongyi – 4.5Alexandra Kosteniuk – 3.5Harika Dronavalli – 3.5Bibisara Assaubayeva – 3Sarasadat Khademalsharieh – 3Elisabeth Paehtz – 3 Round 9 pairings and dates The ninth and final round of the third leg in the
Singapore Championship 2025: Tin Jingyao and Gong Qianyun retain titles
GM Tin Jingyao and WGM Gong Qianyun successfully defended their titles as Singapore’s national chess champions. The 76th Singapore National Championship, featuring a record prize pool, took place at the Asian Civilisations Museum from February 4–25. Men and women competed in a single event but were ranked separately. GM Tin Jingyao dominated the tournament, achieving a perfect score of 9/9 with an impressive tournament performance rating of 3000. GM Siddharth Jagadeesh finished second, 2.5 points behind the champion, while four players—IM Enrique Paciencia, FM Jayden Wong, Tang Yiheng, and Elliot Wong—tied for third place with 6/9. Paciencia claimed bronze thanks to a superior Buchholz tiebreak score. In the women’s competition, WGM Gong Qianyun won her 11th National Championship title after defeating WIM Anjela Khegay in an exciting tiebreaker. Both players had finished the tournament with 5/9. This victory marks an extraordinary milestone, as it is also Gong’s 10th consecutive title, cementing a decade of her supremacy in Singaporean women’s chess. WIM Anjela Khegay took silver, while Eden Pang completed the podium with bronze. Final standings: 1 GM Tin, Jingyao 2582 9 2 GM Siddharth, Jagadeesh 2496 6½ 3 IM Paciencia, Enrique 2259 6 4 FM Wong, Zhenyong Jayden 2393 6 5 Tang, Yiheng 1969 6 6 Wong, Yen-Hsiu Elliot 1847 6 7 IM Susilodinata, Andrean 2359 5½ 8 WGM Gong, Qianyun W 2297 5 9 WIM Khegay, Anjela W 2037 5 10 AGM Kapoor, Satvik 2116 5 Photos: Singapore Chess Federation
FIDE World Youth Championships 2025 in Durres, Albania: Registration Open
FIDE and the Albanian Chess Federation invite all national chess federations to participate in the 2025 FIDE World Youth Chess Championships (U14, U16, and U18). The competitions will be held in Durres, Albania, from October 3 (arrival) to October 16 (departure). Each national federation may register one official player in each category (Under 14, Under 16, and Under 18, Open and Girls). This totals six official players plus one accompanying person (with a valid FIDE ID) per federation, all of whom are invited by the organizers. Additionally, players who finished 1st–3rd in the 2024 World Youth Championships (U14, U16, U18), as well as the gold medalists of the most recent Continental Youth Championships, earn the personal right to participate in the corresponding or a higher age category. Registration deadline: August 2, 2025. Invitation letter and regulations (PDF) FIDE World Youth Chess Championships 2025 official website: https://worldyouth2025.fide.com E-mail: worldyouth@fide.com
FIDE World Junior Championship 2025 begins in Petrovac, Montenegro
The FIDE World Junior Chess Championship kicked off in Petrovac, Montenegro, on Tuesday, February 25. The competition, open to players under 20 years old, features two categories: Open and Girls. Nearly 230 players from 44 countries are participating in the event with 157 players (including 12 GMs) from 63 countries in the open section. The highest-rated player in the tournament is GM Daniel Dardha (2651) from the Belgium. The Girls’ section has attracted 98 players, including seven WGMs from 27 countries. IM Lu Miaoyi (2432) from China is the tournament’s top seed. The championship’s first day featured a technical meeting led by Chief Arbiter IA Nebojsa Baralic and FIDE Technical Delegate Sergei Indeikin. The opening ceremony took place before Round 1, graced by the presence of Montenegro’s Minister of Sports and Youth, Dragoslav Scekic; Jovan Milovic, President of the Montenegro Chess Federation; and FIDE delegate Sergei Indeikin. Minister Scekic and MCF President Milovic made the tournament’s symbolic first move. The opening round of the Junior World Chess Championship in Petrovac provided the spectators with an abundance of fighting games and upsets despite a significant Elo and experience differences on most of the boards. One of the tensest games of the first round was played on board 3. One of the pre-tournament favorites GM Aleksey Grebnev representing FIDE faced FM Mateu Boci of Albania. The game started with the Nimzo-Indian Defence with Aleksey opting for a sub-variation of the Rubinstein system recently popularized by Richard Rapport. Black did not react in the most principled way and proceeded to develop in the Colle – Zukertort reversed fashion. Objectively, White got a small positional advantage aided by the f3-pawn effectively restricting Black’s minor pieces. However, the position remained mostly unclear and full of life. A few moves later Grebnev went for an interesting pawn structure transformation with a long-term plan of transferring his passive e2-knight to a glorious central outpost on e5. However, this plan takes a long time to execute and Mateu generated counterplay on the kingside with a typical AlphaZero-inspired h-pawn thrust. The position was getting increasingly sharp and complex with White finally achieving his strategic goals but severely weakening his king in the process. The first critical moment came on move 35, when, in mutual time trouble Grebnev went all with 35. Qxc6 – a greedy decision which should have backfired. Instead, 35. Rh2 would have allowed White to fight on equal terms albeit Black is probably to be preferred in a practical game. The young Albanian player reacted energetically, activating both rooks and putting his opponent on the verge of crushing defeat. Objectively, Black’s attack was decisive. However, nerves seemed to take their toll at this point–Mateu did not consider a professional decision to first repeat the position a couple of times to reach the time control with 39…Nh1+ 40. Kg1 Ng3 41. Kf2. With 30 extra minutes on the clock, Boci was very likely to crown his attack with a victory. In fact, the cold-blooded 41…Rb2 (or even 41…Ra2) puts White in zugzwang as both 42. Qf3 and 42. Qa8+ Kh7 43. Qf3 are met with Nh1+ -+. Instead, disaster struck as Black blundered with 39…Qh5??, missing 40. Qa8+! Kh7 41. Qf3! +-. Suddenly 41…Nh1 does not work anymore because of 42.Ke3! Aleksey was quick to capitalize on his lucky chance as Black had to exchange Queens and the resulting endgame was hopeless for him due to a very strong passed d-pawn. Grebnev went on to convert easily, finishing the game with a nice tactical shot. A heartbreaking loss for FM Mateu Boci, who played an inspired game against a very strong opponent. Still, if he continues to perform at the same level, more GM scalps will be coming his way soon. And for GM Grebnev this narrow escape may very well boost his confidence. After all, you cannot be a champion without a little luck involved. Standings after Round 1 Open Standings after Round 1 Girls Photos: Vlada Crne Gore Official webste: worldjunior2025.sahcg.me/