Gukesh’s crisis just the nature of the game: Anand

bombay: In the group discussion elbow room of a posh bombay hotel, Viswanathan Anand walks around a tabularise signing chess boards. These were mementos that every player competing in the third season of the Global Chess League was adding their autograph to.

Yet, Anand’s name carries greater value. Dressed in the yellow jersey of the Ganges Grandmasters franchise, with his name and the number 64 neatly emblazoned on the back, Anand — a five-time world champion — is the only male player competing at the event to have been a world No.1.

At 56, India’s first Grandmaster — he earned the title in 1988 — may have deliberately reduced his playing time, but he remains an active figure and is the current world No.12.

“Chess players are geared to get feedback from the games. Learning, relearning… But the fact that I still like the game enough that I want to do it,” Anand said to HT. “Motivation is very important and the willingness to relearn.”

Anand has seen the chess evolution from close quarters. Ever since his breakthrough in the 1980s, he has remained a leading figure. He was the pathbreaker who showed India the dream of playing in the upper echelons of the game. He also had a role of ushering in the new generation of Indian stars that are dominating the sport.

He’s seen and done it all. And through that experience, he knows all too well the individual struggles the current crop is facing. Especially the slump plaguing reigning world champion D Gukesh.

Ever since the 19-year-old became the youngest-ever male to win the World Chess Championship last year, he has struggled to build on that momentum. A year after winning the coveted title, going into the GCL season, Gukesh played 170 matches across formats, winning only 42, drawing 67 and losing 61.

Ask Anand if he ever went through a difficult spell in his career, he starts listing: “2001 was quite profound, 2006 at some point was a mild slump. Then 2011 and 2012 was quite a severe crisis. Even 2013, I can imagine. Then there was another crisis in 2017,” he said.

“I had a couple of moments in my career where I really thought, ‘can I go on?’ Because it seemed like both my play and my results kind of seemed to hit a wall. And then also you lose confidence in yourself completely, and it takes a long time to think.

“It’s not like I spent two weeks working and then things got better. The slump was for months, even a year. But you keep soldiering through. You play less, you take more breaks, you try to enjoy some of the facets of life. And I think part of you understands that you have to recover both emotionally and technically.”

What Gukesh is going through, as Anand puts it, is “part of the rough and tumble of life.”

“Every time you show something, your peers are all reacting. They’re all trying to change something and come back and confront you with new problems,” he explained.

“Setbacks are just inevitable in that sense. And I think Gukesh’s crisis probably has more to do with the demands of social media than with his chess. His chess is fine. He would want better results in some of the formats, but this is not a crisis as such. It’s the nature of the game.”

Anand is certain that Gukesh will find his way back to the results that took him to the world title. And he’s also sure of the capabilities of Arjun Erigaisi, the India No.1 who recently faced a setback after he failed to qualify for the Candidates for the second consecutive time.

The 22-year-old world No.5 is the only player from the Big 3 of Indian chess’ new generation (which includes R Praggnanandhaa) to have never made it to the Candidates. At the World Cup last month, Erigaisi lost out in the quarter-final in what was his last attempt to make it to the 2026 Candidates - a tournament that is the gateway to the World Championship match.

“He’s good enough to make the Candidates. Nobody will be surprised if he gets there. But it’s not like it’s an easy path,” Anand said.

“(Erigaisi’s) rivals are also very, very strong. One of the problems is, there are far too many players who belong in the Candidates, but it can’t be a tournament of 16 or 32. So, the elimination process is by definition a little bit cruel.”

All that awaits is a moment of inspiration.

Anand once waited for his own moment of inspiration. Going into the 2008 World Championship match as the defending champion against Vladimir Kramnik, Anand remembered a comment the Russian had made in 1995, after the Indian lost to Garry Kasparov.

“He said something to the effect of ‘Vishy came to the World Championship and just played it like they played any other event. (He) didn’t do anything special for it’,” Anand recalled.

That fueled him when he faced Kramnik for the title in 2008.

“It was my best match. I made a very good strategy for that match, designed for him.”

Anand waited for 13 years for that moment. For the young guns Gukesh and Erigaisi, there’s plenty of time.

Been a sports journalist for over 11 years. Won the best article award at the PII-ICRC Annual Awards in 2024. Read Less ...Read More

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