'This was Magnus Carlsen’s prediction. What this shows...': Anand Mahindra revels in D Gukesh's win

After almost three weeks of relentless chess action, India's star Grandmaster D Gukesh has emerged to the fore and won the FIDE Candidates 2024 tournament. Gukesh drew with Hikaru Nakamura in round 14 of the competition to thereby take his points tally to 9. The rest of the seven competitors finished behind Gukesh, and as it happened, a historic moment ensued in Toronto, Canada. First time after the 5-time World Champion Viswanathan Anand, an Indian will challenge for the World Championship. Gukesh will square off against the current Chess World Champion, Ding Liren, later in the year.

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Magnus Carlsen's prediction about Gukesh before FIDE Candidates tournament

Ahead of the start of the FIDE Candidates 2024, former world champion Magnus Carlsen was asked to predict who will win the competition. Carlsen took note of each of the eight challengers and put them under different categories as per how they would likely fare in the competition. According to Carlsen, Hikaru and Fabiano Caruana were the favorites to clinch to World Championship spot, and he also put Ian Nepomniachtchi as the top contender. Surprisingly he did not give the eventual winner Gukesh any chance and fielded him beside Vidit Gujrathi (who also had a decent campaign finishing 6th) in the "Will do poorly" bracket.

Also Read | 'I knew he was special ever since our first game. He was just 12': Chess community lauds Gukesh

Anand Mahindra on Carlsen's prediction and Gukesh's brilliance

Following the culmination of FIDE Candidates 2024, India's billionaire businessman, Anand Mahindra, has pointed out the wrongly proven prediction of Magnus Carlsen and expressed his opinion by disseminating a typical lesson. According to Mahindra, Carlsen factored in the parameters that were prevalent before the start of the tournament and calculated it rightly, but Gukesh meanwhile evolved and soaked the pressure to come out as the biggest force. Putting further heed to it, Mahindra wrote that "learning machine" Gukesh will supplement more improvement and will enter the World Championship in front of Ding Liren as a formidable competitor.

At 17, Gukesh is the youngest ever Grandmaster to win the FIDE Candidates. Should he beat Ding Liren later in the year then he will become the second World Chess Champion from India, after of course the mighty Viswanathan Anand.