Ding hangs on in nerve-shredding Game 13 draw with Gukesh as title tilt nears climax

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Ding Liren held on for a high-wire draw with Indian teenager Gukesh Dommaraju on Wednesday in the penultimate 13th game of their world championship showdown, leaving the match knotted at 6½-all with one scheduled contest remaining.

The 32-year-old defending champion appeared visibly shaken at the board after leaving himself less than five minutes to make the last 10 moves before the time control, where players are given an additional half hour. But he defended brilliantly under nerve-shredding clock pressure to stabilize the position before it fizzled out to a peaceful result by threefold repetition after more than five hours. Game 14 is Thursday.

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The players

China’s Ding Liren is defending the world chess championship against fast-rising Indian teenager Gukesh Dommaraju. The best-of-14-games match is scheduled to take place from 23 November to 15 December at Resorts World Sentosa in Singapore for an overall prize fund of $2.5m (£1.98m).

Ding became China's first men’s world chess champion by defeating Ian Nepomniachtchi last year in Kazakhstan, winning the title vacated by longtime world No 1 Magnus Carlsen of Norway. But the 32-year-old from Zhejiang province has played only 44 classical games in the 19 months since winning the world title while battling personal difficulties including depression and will go off as an underdog in his first world title defense.

Gukesh, commonly known as Gukesh D, stunned the chess establishment by winning the eight-man Candidates tournament in Toronto aged 17 to become the youngest ever challenger for the world championship, finishing top of a stacked field that included Nepomniachtchi, Hikaru Nakamura and Fabiano Caruana. The 18-year-old can shatter the record for youngest ever world champion held by Garry Kasparov, who was 22 when he dethroned Karpov in their 1985 rematch in Moscow.

The format

The match will consist of 14 classical games with each player awarded one point for a win and a half-point for a draw. Whoever reaches seven and a half points first will be declared the champion.

The time control for each game in the classical portion is 120 minutes per side for the first 40 moves, then 30 minutes for the rest of the game, with a 30-second increment per move starting with move 41.

If the score is equal after 14 games, tiebreak games with faster time controls will be played:

• A match consisting of four rapid games with 15 minutes per side and a 10-second increment starting with move 1 would be played. If a player scores 2½ points or more, he would win the championship.

• If the score is still equal, a mini-match of two rapid games would be played, with 10 minutes per side and a five-second increment starting with move 1. If a player scored 1½ points or more, he would win the championship.

• If the score is equal after the rapid portion, a mini-match of two blitz games would be played, with a time control of three minutes per side and a two-second increment starting with move 1. If a player scored 1½ points or more, he would win the championship. A drawing of lots would take place before each mini-match to decide which player plays with the white pieces.

• If the blitz mini-match are tied, a single blitz game with a time control of three minutes per side and a two-second increment starting with move 1 would be played, and the winner would win the championship. A drawing of lots would decide which player plays with the white pieces. If this game was drawn, another blitz game with reversed colors would be played with the same time control, and the winner would win the championship. This process is repeated until either player wins a game.

Players are not allowed to agree to a draw before black's 40th move. A draw claim before then is only permitted if a threefold repetition or stalemate has occurred.

The schedule

Sat 23 Nov Opening ceremony and technical meeting

Sun 24 Nov Rest day

Mon 25 Nov Game 1 (Gukesh–Ding, 0-1)

Tue 26 Nov Game 2 (Ding-Gukesh, ½-½)

Wed 27 Nov Game 3 (Gukesh-Ding, 1-0)

Thu 28 Nov Rest day

Fri 29 Nov Game 4 (Ding-Gukesh, ½-½)

Sat 30 Nov Game 5 (Gukesh-Ding, ½-½)

Sun 1 Dec Game 6 (Ding-Gukesh, ½-½)

Mon 2 Dec Rest day

Tue 3 Dec Game 7 (Gukesh-Ding, ½-½)

Wed 4 Dec Game 8 (Ding-Gukesh, ½-½)

Thu 5 Dec Game 9 (Gukesh-Ding, ½-½)

Fri 6 Dec Rest day

Sat 7 Dec Game 10 (Ding-Gukesh, ½-½)

Sun 8 Dec Game 11 (Gukesh-Ding, 1-0)

Mon 9 Dec Game 12 (Ding-Gukesh, 1-0)

Tue 10 Dec Rest Day

Wed 11 Dec Game 13 (Gukesh-Ding, ½-½)

Thu 12 Dec Game 14

Fri 13 Dec Tiebreaks (if necessary)

Sat 14 Dec Closing ceremony

All games start at 5pm local time, 2.30pm in India, 9am in London, 4am in New York.

“It’s fitting that the match goes to the last game, because we’ve both showed a lot of fighting spirit and played some very entertaining chess,” Gukesh said afterward.

The challenger betrayed no sign of nerve in his final opportunity with the favored white pieces, opening with 1 e4 for the third time with Ding once more responding with the French Defense. Gukesh blitzed out his moves quickly before offering up the first wrinkle with the near-novelty 8 Be3, prompting Ding to think for more than 37 minutes before responding with 8...Nb6.

Better out of the opening with a yawning clock advantage, Gukesh turned up the pressure with the tricky 22 Bf4! before black’s passive 23...Rb7 left Ding in a dangerous squeeze. Gukesh’s choice for a material exchange shortly after (25 Bxe7 Rexe7) released the tension and appeared to let Ding off the hook, but the champion’s decision to retreat his queen (30...Qf7?!) rather than capture on e1 badly undercut his position.

“I thought that after 24 Bd6 I should have a quite nice advantage, which probably was the case, but I couldn’t see a knockout blow.” Gukesh said. “Maybe there wasn’t one.”

The critical moment came when Ding was able to find the tricky 31...Rf8 amid the time crunch when all other moves were losing. From there Gukesh was unable to convert his advantage before neither could make progress in a rook endgame. They agreed to split the point after 69 moves and 5hr 6min.

Ding entered the first defense of his world championship having gone 28 classical games without a win, a dreadful run of form that saw him drop to 23rd in the world rankings and prompted the oddsmakers to install him as roughly a 3-1 longshot in the match. But he sprang a major surprise in Game 1 by winning as black, ending the 10-month winless streak with flair.

Game 2 was a quiet draw, before Gukesh roared back with a win in Game 3. The fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth and 10th games were each draws. Gukesh won on Sunday in Game 11 before Ding struck back in Monday’s Game 12.

The $2.5m competition resumes on Thursday with Ding playing as white in the 14th and final classical game. Either player can clinch the title with a win. If it results in another draw and the match ends in a 7-7 deadlock, a series of tiebreak games with faster time controls will be played on Friday. Tiebreakers have been necessary to decide three of the past four world championship matches, and four of the past seven, including Ding’s win over Russia’s Ian Nepomniachtchi last year for the title abdicated by Magnus Carlsen.

While Ding has been regarded as the underdog in the match due to his unremarkable form, he would go off as a slight favorite if the match was decided in rapid or blitz games. Notably, the leading online prediction betting market Polymarket forecasted Ding as the winner for the first time during the match after Wednesday’s result.

The 18-year-old Gukesh, currently ranked fifth in the world, is bidding to shatter the record for youngest ever undisputed world champion held by Garry Kasparov, who was 22 when he dethroned Anatoly Karpov in their 1985 rematch in Moscow.