India’s Koneru Humpy and Divya Deshmukh are set to face each other in Game 2 of the FIDE Women’s World Cup final on Sunday. Earlier on Saturday, the Game 1 between both ended in a draw in Batumi, Georgia.
The draw with black means Humpy, the two-time World Rapid champion, holds a slight edge going in the second and final game under the classical chess rules in the two-game mini-match, and should the deadlock continue, games of shorter duration will be played on Monday to determine the winner.
In Game 1, Humpy employed the Queen’s gambit accepted as black and it turned out to be a pretty fascinating game right out of the opening as Divya, 19, came up with a piece sacrifice early to deny the black king the right to castle.
Humpy was the first to err and, according to computers, Divya had things under control on the 14th move. However, in her bid to recover the extra material, Divya, who has secured a place in the Candidates tournament with her sterling performance here, missed a promising continuation.
What followed the exchange of all minor pieces and the ensuing queen and rook endgame gave enough counter play to both players. The game was eventually drawn after Humpy sacrificed her rook to force perpetual checks.
In her post-game interview, Humpy admitted she had narrowly escaped defeat: “I think she was clearly better after 12.Rb1 instead of 12.Nc4. After that, I’m not sure what was going on, but it was very complicated.”
In the play-off for the third place, Chinese players Zhongyi Tan, the former women’s world champion and top seed Lei Tingjie also decided to split points out of a Queen’s gambit declined game.
With the top two positions sealed for the Indians, the berth to the next Candidates is also assigned, while the player finishing third will also get an entry to the premier event scheduled for 2026.
You can follow all the action from game 2 of the final on our live blog, below:
