World Champion Humbled as Gukesh Slips to Third Consecutive Loss

12 September-Kolkata, India: On Thursday, a 16-year-old Turkish Chess Grandmaster Ediz Gurel forced Indian Grandmaster and world champion Gukesh to quit Round 7 of the FIDE Grand Swiss 2025 in Samarkhand, Uzbekistan. After this, it was the third consecutive loss for the Indian Grand Master.

It is also the third consecutive time, that an Indian Grandmaster and world champion Gukesh lost against a player who only has 100 Elo points lower than him.

16-year-old Gurel beats Indian Champion Gukesh

Due to this loss, Gukesh also became the first Chess Grandmaster and world champion in history to lose three consecutive matches in a row against opponents having at least 100 lower Elo points than him. Before the loss against the 16-year-old Turkish chess prodigy Gurel(Elo 2631), Gukesh lost the remaning two matches to Abhimanyu Mishra (Elo 2611)in Round 5 and Nikolas Theodorou (2646) in Round 6 respectively.

The 16-year-old Indian boy Abhimanyu Mishra also recreated history as he became the only youngest player to defeat a current chess and world champion in classical chess.

In the match between Gukesh and Ediz Gurel, Gukesh, who was playing with black pieces, was not struggling in his early phases but made a comeback in the middle, only to stumble all the way down in the end after he was forced to quit with only 52 moves.

The video of Gukesh forced to quit the match against a 16-year-old Gurel became viral on social media as the Indian Grandmaster suffered another crucial and historic defeat.

Gukesh’s next challenge will be Divya Deshmukh

After this heartbreaking loss, Gukesh will face his fellow countryman and the current Women FIDE Chess Champion Divya Deshmukh, who is also the one of the two females in the Open section.

Indian Chess Grandmaster Divya Deshmukh secured a second victory in the Open section against the Serbian Grandmaster Velimir Ivic on Thursday.