India’s rising talent Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa had a day to remember at Tata Steel Wijk aan Zee on Tuesday. The 18-year-old from Chennai defeated China’s world champion, Ding Liren, with the black pieces for the second year in succession at the “chess Wimbledon” and also jumped to No 11 in the live rankings, where he now sits one place ahead of India’s former world champion Vishy Anand.
There was a curious symmetry. One round earlier Ding had seemed to be running into world champion form when he caught another Indian teen, Dommaraju Gukesh, 17, with a mating attack on the white king in the middle of the board. That result also repeated what had happened when the same players met at Wijk 2023.
