IM Divya Deshmukh made it to the fourth round of the ongoing FIDE Women’s World Cup in Batumi, Georgia after defeating Serbia’s Teodora Injac. But not before she had to “negotiate” with her mind. Having won the first game with black pieces on Saturday, Divya just needed a draw on Sunday with colours reversed to secure a spot in the next round. But, as Divya recounted after Sunday’s game, getting a draw was harder than getting a win in the first game.
“Today actually was tougher than yesterday because I absolutely just wanted to draw and qualify. But my mind couldn’t search for ways how to make a draw. All I kept thinking was ambitious (play) and then I was like ‘no, we don’t want that today,’” Divya told FIDE in a hilarious interview.
Besides Divya, Koneru Humpy also made it through to the 4th round while Harika Dronavalli (vs Greece’s Stavroula Tsolakidou), Vantika Agrawal (vs Kateryna Lagno) and Vaishali Rameshbabu (vs USA’s Carissa Yip) will fight it out in the tiebreaks today after their two classical games could not yield a winner.
Divya said that the last FIDE Women’s World Cup was very important for her as it had given her a glimpse of what top-level chess looks like.
Asked what that level looks like, Divya said: “It’s very stressful, but I wouldn’t be anywhere else.”
WATCH: Divya Deshmukh’s hilarious interview
Divya did not have a bye in the first round, unlike other strong players. She admitted to being a bit nervous before the start of the tournament.
“I was a bit nervous before the first round because I hadn’t played a super serious tournament since like Grand Prix. And after that, I played rapid, blitz, and open tournaments. So, I kind of lost my rhythm. But after the
first game, I was like, ‘Oh, okay. I still got it’,” Divya said with a grin.
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Divya also said that she was happy winning all the games in classical format itself rather than needing tiebreaks (playoffs) to decide the winner.
“I hope I don’t go there (in tiebreaks). I hope I just win or else, you know, playoffs are nerve-wracking. They they just kill you,” Divya smiled. She then said that she sometimes skips her prep to watch the other players fighting it out in the rapid and blitz tiebreaks.
The FIDE World Cup sees head-to-head knockout battles across two games between two players in classical format with each player playing with white pieces once. If the two games cannot determine a winner, players play best-of-two-game tiebreaks. In the tiebreaks, players first play two games in the 15 minutes (+10 seconds increment per move, popularly called 15+10) format. If that also cannot separate the two players, from this point on, the time gets reduced at each two-game interval unless there’s a winner. So, if after the 15+10 games, the scores are still level, players play two more games with 10 minutes (+10 seconds increment per move, called 10+10). Then the time trickles down to five minutes + three seconds (5+3).
After this point, if players are still deadlocked, the game enters chess’ equivalent of a sudden death: a winner-takes-all single game of three minutes + 2 seconds. This 3+2 game will be played until there’s a winner.
