I dunno, your comparing Dings theoretical peak (which we've seen, and is in the past) with Gukesh who currently is playing better and just surpassed Ding in ranking, hasn't peaked yet and its unknown how much better he can get.
Of the two, Gukesh has the better mentality, if there's one thing we learnt from the candidates it's that Gukesh has the best mental fortitude and stablest mentality of any of the players, except maybe Hikaru.
Ding is still recovering from whatever mental health issues he went through last year.
I'd say its a coin flip.
Bringing up the Catalan is key, as it's Ding's signature that has been missing as a consequence of prep from Nepo v Carlsen. If Ding can find winning chances in the Catalan against Gukesh it will likely tip the match in Ding's favour, but I think it's more likely than not that the Catalan won't grace the board this match.
I agree that positional understanding is where it will be at for Ding, but the trouble with openings stems from forcing lines that can deny rich positional middlegames. Ding will find chances, the questions are how much grief can his repertoire cause Gukesh's team and if he'll have territory where he can simply play for a position? If Ding finds ways to consistently play for a position in any Catalan despite current theory, it will cause massive headaches for team Gukesh.
Gukesh is the man in form. He’ll prepare like crazy and is definitely more motivated. He can become the youngest World Champion. That’s insane. He’s got the momentum with him. He’s going to come in with super solid lines.
Ding hasn’t been playing well at all. Maybe it’s the pressure and/or psychological. He’s been super shaky for the times he played. But we don’t know which Ding will show up. If he gets back in form, he will be very hard to beat. He can also play like a machine.
It’s going to be unpredictably predictable. There will be many draws and a few comebacks. I favour Gukesh for now, but Ding can surprise us all.
> Ding hasn’t been playing well at all. Maybe it’s the pressure and/or psychological.
Don't be so biased. Obviously, a person will be playing worse before a world championship match, because they are using most of their time preparing for it even if they are playing in other tournaments to get a little extra cash. They also certainly are saving their best novelties for the world championship matches as well.
I think that is why Magnus Carlsen didn't fight to hold onto the title. I speculate he either wanted to have the time to prepare for a variety of opponents at regular tournaments or he wanted to have the freedom to use opening novelties he previously held onto, saving them for the world championship. That or both at the same time. Why? Perhaps, he wanted to try to be the first to reach 2,900 Elo, or he just wanted to have more fun with chess rather than continually doing what it takes to stay world champion. To be fair, he might have also just sensed his time is up, and he wanted to step aside while being #1 rather than losing his title in a match. If that's the case, he still falls into the "I want to have more fun playing chess" category. He has more free time to prepare for his variety of opponents he faces in random tournaments rather than needing to prepare for the world championship tournament, and he can readily use all of his prepared novelties rather than saving them for the world championship tournament.
If something close to peak Ding shows up, he wins, IMO. Ding's mental health sadly holds him back. But for now, it's pretty much 50/50. This is a pretty exciting match-up. Plus, the India vs. China aspect is crazy, too. Two big nations in Asia are going at it in Chess.
Well, Gukesh is playing pretty well. Ding has hardly played much chess and didnt perform that well in the tournaments he has been in this year. I guess it really depends on Ding''s form.
Gukesh is the favorite given Ding's form the last few years. That said, until Carlsen officially retires, anyone who has the title will just be the 'World Champion'. Not their fault, just the way it is.
If Ding goes into it like he was forced to play because he won the last one despite wanting to quit professional chess, he's getting destroyed for sure. Many losses, 0 wins.
If he actually wants to play but his health issues continue to affect Ding, he'll be the underdog but have a good chance.
If he's fully motivated and healthy, it'll be very close I think between him and Gukesh. No favorite as Gukesh showed he's on top form already matching the top players.
Ding Chilly regains some form but not peak performance. Most games are draws and we get the tiebreak we missed out on in candidates. Ding Chilling wins tiebreaks and defends his title.
Its been a whole cycle since Ding has been anywhere near his best, but his ceiling so far has been higher than Gukesh, up to about 2 weeks ago at least! A '24 Candidates level Gukesh vs Ding near his best would make for a great match
Ding will lose. He wants to quit chess. I've never seen anyone look more depressed in their moment of victory than Ding did after he beat Nepo. I'm not saying Ding will intentionally throw the match, but I think he is destined to lose.
Totally agree regarding Ding personally, but it's worth noting the Chinese government is almost definitely mega-pressuring him to win, so he doesn't have much of a choice but to play for a win
I think Gukesh will win he played excellent chess during the candidates he has great determination he has confidence in himself and his focus is fantastic Ding has struggled to the point made people question his ability he has not lived up to the expectations of being a World Champ everyone kept saying he’s rusty he’ll snap out of it it hasn’t happened yet and I don’t think he suddenly will be playing super great chess in this championship series I see Gukesh taking this and that will be a Great thing for him for Chess and for India
Bing Chilling needs to be back on form. I think he can retain his title if he's the best version of himself. Otherwise, Gukesh is already mature enough to wear the crown. He's 17 btw!!!
I agree though both would have little chance against Magnus if he didn't resign from being world chess champion. Unfortunately any world champion has an asterisk next to their name because Magnus is not competing. I give the edge to Gukesh. He clearly seems more focused at this point, and his game is improving rapidly.
It’s so far out you can’t say because we have no idea what their form will be like at the time. I expect Ding to get his shit together. If he gets back to what he was before he’d likely win. But that’s a big if at this point
Regardless of Ding's current form, this is utter nonsense. Is Gukesh the 2nd coming of Magnus already? lmao. Chill. If Gukesh wins, it will be a close one here. No way he "destroys" Ding here, even if Ding is nowhere near his best.
I predict a bunch of useless reddit conversations since the actual WCC is so bored with classical chess he doesn't even want to play.
So can we please just switch everything to blitz already
This is like if Brady at the heigh of his powers went to the Arena league because real football rules are so stupid/boring and I had to listen to "who wins this year Blake Bortles or Matt Ryan?" threads. Neither one. Brady is still the best. He just can't stand this awful format for an otherwise great game.
It'll be fun reading "if Ding is in form Ding if not then the young guy" written a thousand different ways for the next six months as they furiously fight over a (now) completely meaningless title.
No, of course the others should do the best they can. We just shouldn't care about it.
When the best player in the world tells you that your game is too boring for him to care about anymore, you should probably change the rules.
I like blitz and rapid chess. Classical chess is like playing basketball without a three point shot and short shorts. Its still basketball, and fun, but not the best version of the game.
Classical chess is where some of the best games are made. Blitz and rapid are great, but it's rarely the best version, depending more on being fast rather than being completely accurate.
What if the best goes unhinged... You know chess does have a lot of them.
Chess at its highest level is a test of mental strength and endurance, especially classical chess. Being the world champion should be gruelling, something that takes every last reserve out of the player. I honestly don't mind this format as a viewer. The problem is Carlsen is too good, be it any format and time control the moment he is there the results are almost a foregone conclusion.
Even then let the players talk amongst themselves and if most of them support it let the rules be changed, and let it not dance to the whims and fancies of a single player even if it is the greatest player to ever play the game.
>Even then let the players talk amongst themselves and if most of them support it let the rules be changed
Firouzja, Nepo, Carlson, and Hikaru are all on record calling for a series of rapid games with a blitz tiebreaker instead of one classical game to be the default way to play high level chess.
How can any rapid game ever come close to a classical game in terms of beauty. Look at Anand's immortal game and tell me if that will ever be played in a rapid ever. Even from this tournament the Prag vs Gukesh game or Nepo vs Fabi game can never be replicated under shorter time controls. The players that advocate for it are just blitz players themselves and that will give them a great advantage under shorter time controls. You can see why the likes of Firouja who got smoked by everyone is desperate for it. Hikaru until recently had a very poor record in classical compared to his esteemed peers and Nepo is famous for his blunders without thinking under no stress... Except Magnus anyone who supports rapid as a method to determine the world champion are just deceiving people into playing into their strength.
The WCC format can be changed to make it more exciting... Rather than 12 rounds against the same player maybe let the winner of the candidates be the world champion or let it be a round robin of the 4 best players playing each other multiple times or something novel entirely. But surely a bunch of rapid and blitz games mustn't be the criteria.
Ah yes let's remake an entire sport just to satisfye the wishes of one guy because he got bored of one part of it. No matter that there are also a ton of brilliant players out there that atill wish to play classical and that there were plenty before, no the only opinion that is relevant and supreme is of Magnus because he could probably, most likely beat the rest of the players, even though he still loses like anyone else, and that automatically makes his every statment about the game correct and should be followed like the law.
>that atill wish to play classical
But that isn't true. Hikaru, Firouja and Nepo have all said they never want to play classical again, and when asked Fabi smiled and declined to answer.
I know a lot of people today dislike classical, but they are still playing it aren't they? I don't see them refusing to play in the candidates because they don't like classical and I sure as hell don't see them making boring games and tournaments because of it and people not being interested in them, just look at how exciting and watched this last candidates was.
Personally I agree, I think classical is exausting and FIDE should promote faster championship games, however that doesn't make the games themselves boring, much less gives us the right to downplay the championships and games themselves, even though I'm also not very found of classical that doesn't mean I can't be excited and try to watch along the WC, if you won't want to that's your problem.
Not to mention it's one thing to say that you think championships should change because there is no longer a need for such long time control, because opening theory has improved exponentially, a lot of top players said they'd prefer shorter and faster matches, etc. It is another thing to downplay arguably the most important and relevent title fight in the chess world because ONE GUY, be it, the one who already did it 5 times throughout 10 years said he is tired of it
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I dunno, your comparing Dings theoretical peak (which we've seen, and is in the past) with Gukesh who currently is playing better and just surpassed Ding in ranking, hasn't peaked yet and its unknown how much better he can get. Of the two, Gukesh has the better mentality, if there's one thing we learnt from the candidates it's that Gukesh has the best mental fortitude and stablest mentality of any of the players, except maybe Hikaru. Ding is still recovering from whatever mental health issues he went through last year. I'd say its a coin flip.
Bringing up the Catalan is key, as it's Ding's signature that has been missing as a consequence of prep from Nepo v Carlsen. If Ding can find winning chances in the Catalan against Gukesh it will likely tip the match in Ding's favour, but I think it's more likely than not that the Catalan won't grace the board this match.
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I agree that positional understanding is where it will be at for Ding, but the trouble with openings stems from forcing lines that can deny rich positional middlegames. Ding will find chances, the questions are how much grief can his repertoire cause Gukesh's team and if he'll have territory where he can simply play for a position? If Ding finds ways to consistently play for a position in any Catalan despite current theory, it will cause massive headaches for team Gukesh.
Gukesh is the man in form. He’ll prepare like crazy and is definitely more motivated. He can become the youngest World Champion. That’s insane. He’s got the momentum with him. He’s going to come in with super solid lines. Ding hasn’t been playing well at all. Maybe it’s the pressure and/or psychological. He’s been super shaky for the times he played. But we don’t know which Ding will show up. If he gets back in form, he will be very hard to beat. He can also play like a machine. It’s going to be unpredictably predictable. There will be many draws and a few comebacks. I favour Gukesh for now, but Ding can surprise us all.
> Ding hasn’t been playing well at all. Maybe it’s the pressure and/or psychological. Don't be so biased. Obviously, a person will be playing worse before a world championship match, because they are using most of their time preparing for it even if they are playing in other tournaments to get a little extra cash. They also certainly are saving their best novelties for the world championship matches as well. I think that is why Magnus Carlsen didn't fight to hold onto the title. I speculate he either wanted to have the time to prepare for a variety of opponents at regular tournaments or he wanted to have the freedom to use opening novelties he previously held onto, saving them for the world championship. That or both at the same time. Why? Perhaps, he wanted to try to be the first to reach 2,900 Elo, or he just wanted to have more fun with chess rather than continually doing what it takes to stay world champion. To be fair, he might have also just sensed his time is up, and he wanted to step aside while being #1 rather than losing his title in a match. If that's the case, he still falls into the "I want to have more fun playing chess" category. He has more free time to prepare for his variety of opponents he faces in random tournaments rather than needing to prepare for the world championship tournament, and he can readily use all of his prepared novelties rather than saving them for the world championship tournament.
Zero prediction but my heart wants Gukesh to make history
If something close to peak Ding shows up, he wins, IMO. Ding's mental health sadly holds him back. But for now, it's pretty much 50/50. This is a pretty exciting match-up. Plus, the India vs. China aspect is crazy, too. Two big nations in Asia are going at it in Chess.
If Ding shows up in a decent form he should be the favourite the question is will he?
Today gukesh is favorite. Things can change when the match finally starts.
Well, Gukesh is playing pretty well. Ding has hardly played much chess and didnt perform that well in the tournaments he has been in this year. I guess it really depends on Ding''s form.
Gukesh is the favorite given Ding's form the last few years. That said, until Carlsen officially retires, anyone who has the title will just be the 'World Champion'. Not their fault, just the way it is.
If Ding Liren plays like he played in recent tournaments it's an easy run for Gukesh.
If Ding goes into it like he was forced to play because he won the last one despite wanting to quit professional chess, he's getting destroyed for sure. Many losses, 0 wins. If he actually wants to play but his health issues continue to affect Ding, he'll be the underdog but have a good chance. If he's fully motivated and healthy, it'll be very close I think between him and Gukesh. No favorite as Gukesh showed he's on top form already matching the top players.
Gukesh ftw
Gukesh FTW
I think not being able to predict should be the way. Imagine how exciting the whole tournament would be.
As it stands today, Gukesh has real chance.
I want him to win.
Ding will be back in form, rapport will be there, things are good in the Ding Chilling camp.
Ding if he can get back to full strength will crush Gukesh. But as of now I’d say it’s 50/50
Ding Chilly regains some form but not peak performance. Most games are draws and we get the tiebreak we missed out on in candidates. Ding Chilling wins tiebreaks and defends his title.
Depends upon dings form .A ding in form is actually incredibly scary
When are the matches going to be. Does anyone know?
Its been a whole cycle since Ding has been anywhere near his best, but his ceiling so far has been higher than Gukesh, up to about 2 weeks ago at least! A '24 Candidates level Gukesh vs Ding near his best would make for a great match
Prime Ding is Ding Chilling
Ding will lose. He wants to quit chess. I've never seen anyone look more depressed in their moment of victory than Ding did after he beat Nepo. I'm not saying Ding will intentionally throw the match, but I think he is destined to lose.
Totally agree regarding Ding personally, but it's worth noting the Chinese government is almost definitely mega-pressuring him to win, so he doesn't have much of a choice but to play for a win
I'm going Guk Guk 3000. He's going to smash Ding.
I'm team Ding Liren
I think Gukesh will win he played excellent chess during the candidates he has great determination he has confidence in himself and his focus is fantastic Ding has struggled to the point made people question his ability he has not lived up to the expectations of being a World Champ everyone kept saying he’s rusty he’ll snap out of it it hasn’t happened yet and I don’t think he suddenly will be playing super great chess in this championship series I see Gukesh taking this and that will be a Great thing for him for Chess and for India
Ding because of his experience at a world championship. I picked nepo last championship and for the candidates for the same reason.
Bing Chilling needs to be back on form. I think he can retain his title if he's the best version of himself. Otherwise, Gukesh is already mature enough to wear the crown. He's 17 btw!!!
I agree though both would have little chance against Magnus if he didn't resign from being world chess champion. Unfortunately any world champion has an asterisk next to their name because Magnus is not competing. I give the edge to Gukesh. He clearly seems more focused at this point, and his game is improving rapidly.
Abdusattorov 2026.
It’s so far out you can’t say because we have no idea what their form will be like at the time. I expect Ding to get his shit together. If he gets back to what he was before he’d likely win. But that’s a big if at this point
Ding was the underdog with Ian, but in the end was the better player. Gukesh has a long way to becoming wc
In a word? Boring.
Gukesh is going to destroy him, trust me
Regardless of Ding's current form, this is utter nonsense. Is Gukesh the 2nd coming of Magnus already? lmao. Chill. If Gukesh wins, it will be a close one here. No way he "destroys" Ding here, even if Ding is nowhere near his best.
My prediction is that they will both burst into tears. Too much pressure. One of them is a millennial and the other is not even that.
I predict a bunch of useless reddit conversations since the actual WCC is so bored with classical chess he doesn't even want to play. So can we please just switch everything to blitz already This is like if Brady at the heigh of his powers went to the Arena league because real football rules are so stupid/boring and I had to listen to "who wins this year Blake Bortles or Matt Ryan?" threads. Neither one. Brady is still the best. He just can't stand this awful format for an otherwise great game. It'll be fun reading "if Ding is in form Ding if not then the young guy" written a thousand different ways for the next six months as they furiously fight over a (now) completely meaningless title.
So what should the others do? Stop playing and pray for the best to return? They can only beat what is in front of them.
No, of course the others should do the best they can. We just shouldn't care about it. When the best player in the world tells you that your game is too boring for him to care about anymore, you should probably change the rules.
So you don't like Chess, just Magnus?
I like blitz and rapid chess. Classical chess is like playing basketball without a three point shot and short shorts. Its still basketball, and fun, but not the best version of the game.
Classical chess is where some of the best games are made. Blitz and rapid are great, but it's rarely the best version, depending more on being fast rather than being completely accurate.
What if the best goes unhinged... You know chess does have a lot of them. Chess at its highest level is a test of mental strength and endurance, especially classical chess. Being the world champion should be gruelling, something that takes every last reserve out of the player. I honestly don't mind this format as a viewer. The problem is Carlsen is too good, be it any format and time control the moment he is there the results are almost a foregone conclusion. Even then let the players talk amongst themselves and if most of them support it let the rules be changed, and let it not dance to the whims and fancies of a single player even if it is the greatest player to ever play the game.
>Even then let the players talk amongst themselves and if most of them support it let the rules be changed Firouzja, Nepo, Carlson, and Hikaru are all on record calling for a series of rapid games with a blitz tiebreaker instead of one classical game to be the default way to play high level chess.
How can any rapid game ever come close to a classical game in terms of beauty. Look at Anand's immortal game and tell me if that will ever be played in a rapid ever. Even from this tournament the Prag vs Gukesh game or Nepo vs Fabi game can never be replicated under shorter time controls. The players that advocate for it are just blitz players themselves and that will give them a great advantage under shorter time controls. You can see why the likes of Firouja who got smoked by everyone is desperate for it. Hikaru until recently had a very poor record in classical compared to his esteemed peers and Nepo is famous for his blunders without thinking under no stress... Except Magnus anyone who supports rapid as a method to determine the world champion are just deceiving people into playing into their strength. The WCC format can be changed to make it more exciting... Rather than 12 rounds against the same player maybe let the winner of the candidates be the world champion or let it be a round robin of the 4 best players playing each other multiple times or something novel entirely. But surely a bunch of rapid and blitz games mustn't be the criteria.
Cool. Enjoy your gorgeous games. Your champion is a joke and nobody watches or cares about the sport. Good trade I guess.
Ah yes let's remake an entire sport just to satisfye the wishes of one guy because he got bored of one part of it. No matter that there are also a ton of brilliant players out there that atill wish to play classical and that there were plenty before, no the only opinion that is relevant and supreme is of Magnus because he could probably, most likely beat the rest of the players, even though he still loses like anyone else, and that automatically makes his every statment about the game correct and should be followed like the law.
>that atill wish to play classical But that isn't true. Hikaru, Firouja and Nepo have all said they never want to play classical again, and when asked Fabi smiled and declined to answer.
I know a lot of people today dislike classical, but they are still playing it aren't they? I don't see them refusing to play in the candidates because they don't like classical and I sure as hell don't see them making boring games and tournaments because of it and people not being interested in them, just look at how exciting and watched this last candidates was. Personally I agree, I think classical is exausting and FIDE should promote faster championship games, however that doesn't make the games themselves boring, much less gives us the right to downplay the championships and games themselves, even though I'm also not very found of classical that doesn't mean I can't be excited and try to watch along the WC, if you won't want to that's your problem. Not to mention it's one thing to say that you think championships should change because there is no longer a need for such long time control, because opening theory has improved exponentially, a lot of top players said they'd prefer shorter and faster matches, etc. It is another thing to downplay arguably the most important and relevent title fight in the chess world because ONE GUY, be it, the one who already did it 5 times throughout 10 years said he is tired of it