GM Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu won the Superbet Chess Classic Romania 2025, his first Grand Chess Tour victory. He earns $77,667 and 10 GCT points.
The path was far from smooth. He drew comfortably against GM Levon Aronian in his last classical game, but two of his chasers managed to win on demand. GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave inflicted a third loss onto GM Jan-Krzysztof Duda, and GM Alireza Firouzja, from a worse position, outfoxed GM Bogdan-Daniel Deac in a King’s Indian Defense. Ultimately, Praggnanandhaa defeated Vachier-Lagrave in blitz playoffs to claim the title.
The third event of the Grand Chess Tour will be the 2025 SuperUnited Rapid & Blitz Croatia, taking place on July 1-6.
Vachier-Lagrave, Firouzja Catch Up, But Praggnanandhaa Triumphs
Caruana Misses Out On Playoffs, So Escapes Vs. Abdusattorov
Vachier-Lagrave and Firouzja won in the final round to squeeze into a three-way tie for first. It was only after three blitz games that followed that Praggnanandhaa won the title.
Final Standings After Round 9
Praggnanandhaa earned a bonus of $10,000 ahead of the two other players tied in first.
Prize Distribution
We were treated to playoffs after Praggnanandhaa drew his game, and both French participants won on demand. Meanwhile, all the other games ended in draws.
Vachier-Lagrave, Firouzja Catch Up, But Praggnanandhaa Triumphs
Praggnanandhaa ½-½ Aronian
Praggnanandhaa’s game plan was, first and foremost, to play it safe. A draw would guarantee at least shared first—and in the French Defense Tarrasch Variation that transpired, the Indian grandmaster never took a risk. By move 18, Praggnanandhaa gained the bishop pair against bishop vs. knight, a “risk-free position” in his words that only he could win. Aronian held it, no problem, and a draw was decent news for the tournament leader, who would become the tournament winner.
Vachier-Lagrave 1-0 Duda
On the white side of the Ruy Lopez, Arkhangelsk Variation, Vachier-Lagrave sacrificed a pawn and got a significant time advantage out of the opening—though, one that came and went several times. By the time Duda played 21…Qf6, a decent move but not one Vachier-Lagrave expected, he had 43 minutes against an hour and 29, one less minute than he had started with.
Despite a serious time imbalance, Duda found the nice sequence of 26…h6, 27…g5!, and 28…Rce8 (the move Vachier-Lagrave missed) and quickly reached an equal heavy-piece endgame. If Duda wanted to draw, he had at least two good opportunities to trade queens, but Vachier-Lagrave suggested that the choice of 32…Qg4 (32…Qxf1 would have been safe) “was ambitious.” Duda’s next refusal to trade queens with 34…Re4?? (34…Qe4 was equal) was the decisive mistake, and Vachier-Lagrave had a winning attack starting with a little king move:
It was a dream come true for Vachier-Lagrave, while Duda finished the tournament in last place. Svidler summarized Duda’s performance as follows: “It’s really not the start to the GCT for Jan-Krzysztof. By his standards, a very mediocre performance in the rapid and blitz [in Poland]… and he did not shine, it’s just a disaster here.”
Deac 0-1 Firouzja
After the opening phase, Firouzja looked more likely to lose his game than to win it. But if you don’t believe in magic, you may need to look at more games in the King’s Indian Defense. Firouzja was ever-resourceful to keep the game going, even at the cost of objectivity. As our Resident GM Rafael Leitao writes after move 18,
Looking at this sad position for Black, with the benefit of the evaluation bar, I imagined that White would have a quick victory. I couldn’t have been more wrong: the King’s Indian, and especially with Firouzja playing it, has many resources.
The critical decision that could have backfired severely was Firouzja keeping the queens on. He could have groveled in an engame after 16…Qxd1, but 16…Qf6 kept the game alive, even if it gave White a safe and giant advantage. Deac nursed that edge for most of the game, in fact, but started to lose control when he dropped under five minutes, still with eight moves to make.
Firouzja methodically mounted pressure against the enemy king and had created a mess by move 40 (a mess the engine calls “equal,” mind you). After a single mistake by his opponent, in an already difficult position for White to play, Firouzja won with a direct attack. Leitao analyzes this exciting Game of the Day below.
That meant Praggnanandhaa, Vachier-Lagrave, and Firouzja all made it to the playoffs.
Playoffs
It was the third playoff in five years at the Grand Chess Tour. With the award ceremony needing to happen on the same day, Technical Director Tony Rich explained on the broadcast that tiebreaks had to be expedient. Because we had three players, a blitz single round-robin would be played—no rapid games—and after three games, we didn’t reach armageddons.
After a draw in Firouzja vs. Praggnanandhaa, and then another draw in Vachier-Lagrave vs. Firouzja, it was all decided in the last game, Praggnanandhaa vs. Vachier-Lagrave. What looked like a heavy-piece endgame headed for another draw suddenly turned into a tactical melee.
By move 34, Black (Vachier-Lagrave) had to answer two important questions in order to draw: how are you going to shield your king, and what are you doing against my passed c-pawn? 34…Rc2?! was an answer to the second question, controlling the passed pawn, but the answer to the first question—about king safety—was determined after the decisive mistake 36…a5??, with resignation one move later. Trading rooks with 34…Ra1 or with the more brilliant 36…Re2!, in hindsight, would have limited White’s checkmating potential.
Praggnanandhaa set the record straight after last year. Then, he also made it to the playoffs but lost all three of his games. He said at the award ceremony, “I didn’t do so well last time. I guess getting to rest a few hours before the tiebreak certainly helps,” reminding us that he had a relatively early draw with Aronian and then rested in his hotel room.
He also thanked the large group of people supporting him: his family, his sponsor Adani Group (more about that in our article here), his second who was at the venue, GM Vaibhav Suri, and his trainer GM Ramesh R B. Praggnanandhaa gains nine rating points and is still number seven in the world.
Caruana Misses Out On Playoffs, So Escapes Vs. Abdusattorov
Gukesh ½-½ Caruana
GM Fabiano Caruana was the last player who could have joined the playoffs, but winning on demand with Black against the world champion is a tall order. GM Gukesh Dommaraju, who finishes the tournament a point above last place, played extremely solidly to close out the event, and Caruana never got a chance.
Abdusattorov ½-½ So
Straight out of the opening, a Symmetrical English, we had a back-and-forth game in GM Nodirbek Abdusattorov vs. GM Wesley So. So sacrificed a pawn and had full compensation with active piece play—and could have sacrificed another pawn for an advantage on move 20—but then he didn’t find the most precise path of counterplay. Although So regained the sacrificed pawn, it wasn’t under great conditions, and Abdusattorov achieved positional domination.
Planting the knight on d6 on move 33 would have left Black paralyzed, and Abdusattorov had another chance to find this idea a move later, but even the opposite-color bishop endgame gave White a large advantage. Ultimately, So managed to hold a two-pawns-down position by blockading the dark squares.
Abdusattorov finishes fifth, behind Caruana, while So is in the four-way tie for sixth-ninth. Both players lose under five rating points, with Abdusattorov retaining his world number-six spot, while So drops down two places to number 13.
As for the bigger picture, Vachier-Lagrave still leads the Grand Chess Tour standings by finishing second in the first two events. He’s followed closely by Praggnanandhaa and Firouzja right after. Up next: Zagreb!
You can rewatch the Superbet Chess Classic Romania 2025 on the Saint Louis Chess Club YouTube channel. The games can also be followed on our Events Page.
The 2025 Superbet Romania Chess Classic is the second event on the 2025 Grand Chess Tour and runs from May 7 to 16 at the Grand Hotel Bucharest in Romania. It’s a 10-player round-robin with a time control of 90 minutes for 40 moves, followed by 30 more minutes for the rest of the game, plus a 30-second increment starting on move one. The prize fund is $350,000.
Previous coverage:
