India’s Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa, 16, widely forecast as a future world class grandmaster, added to his growing reputation on Tuesday when he won the €5,000 first prize at the Reykjavik Open with an unbeaten 7.5/9. Earlier in his career, the Chennai teenager was the youngest ever international master, among the youngest ever GMs and the second youngest to reach a 2600 Fide rating.
He was singled out in this column more than five years ago for an 18-move brilliancy at age 11 in the Isle of Man which went global and was compared to Bobby Fischer’s Game of the Century against Donald Byrne.