Pragg all but there for 2026 Candidates after joint title at London Classic

R. Praggnanandhaa has all but claimed the final spot in the 2026 Candidates after finishing as joint winner of the London Chess Classic 2025 Open on Thursday. The 19-year-old Indian had been on a roll throughout 2025 except the FIDE Chess World Cup 2025 in Goa  where last edition’s finalist was knocked out in the fourth round.

  The Candidates Championship next year will be played in Cyprus and should Pragg manage to win the elite eight-man field, it could be an all-Indian final as he would take on D. Gukesh in the World Championship match.

 The three-way title in the Open event earned Praggnanandhaa 8.17 points in the FIDE Circuit Leaderboard, extending his lead at the top with a total of 115.17 points from his best seven events as he gets closer to the last Candidates 2026 spot. He is followed by Anish Giri (81.18), Fabiano Caruana (65.55), Matthias Bluebaum (63.94) and Javokhir Sindarov (63.82), but all four have already qualified for the Candidates through other paths.

Praggnanandhaa’s closest challenger as of date is Germany’s Vincent Keymar, with 55.83 points — still too far behind to pose a serious threat. However, the only player with an outside chance to derail Pragg’s Candidates dream is Uzbekistan No. 1, Nodirbek Abdusattorov.

However, Abdusattorov would need to win all three of the remaining major events: the London Chess Classic Masters 2025, the World Rapid Championship and the World Blitz Championship. While Abdusattorov has dominated the London Masters and is just a draw away from winning the event, clinching both the World Rapid and Blitz titles would be an exceptionally tough challenge as it will have Magnus Carlsen, multiple world champions in both categories, in the fray in Doha.

   Meanwhile, England’s Ameet K. Ghashi, Serbia’s Velimir Ivić and Praggnanandhaa all remained unbeaten throughout the London event, finishing with 7.0 points from nine rounds.   After six rounds, Pragg was co leader with five points alongside Ivic and held that position after drawing with the Serbian in the seventh round.

 The Open was a 120-player, nine-round Swiss tournament with an average rating of 2581 Elo.