Gukesh has everything to gain in title defence: Carlsen

World No. 1 Magnus Carlsen considers Javokhir Sindarov the favourite against reigning champion D Gukesh in the upcoming World Championship. However, Carlsen believes Gukesh has the ability to rediscover his best form and successfully defend his title

Bengaluru: World No. 1 Magnus Carlsen considers challenger Javokhir Sindarov the favourite to win the World Championship but said D Gukesh should not approach his upcoming title defence as a burden, insisting that the reigning champion has “everything to gain”.

Gukesh will take on challenger Sindarov of Uzbekistan in the upcoming World Chess Championship, which will take place in Geneva, Switzerland, from November 24 to December 12.

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“I think the word defend is really not a good place to begin, because in terms of how Gukesh has played for the last couple of years, he should not be in a position where he has to defend anything. He should be in a position where he has everything to gain,” Carlsen said on the sidelines of the ongoing Global Chess League here.

“He has shown previously in 2024 that when things click, he has the potential to play at an extremely high level. I don’t think a lot of people believe that he will do it now, but I think it’s even more of an interesting challenge for him to try and get back to that.

“Chess is a highly psychological game, so it probably won’t take a lot to potentially place some doubts in Sindarov’s mind and some confidence for Gukesh. Obviously, as it stands, there’s no question that Sindarov is the favourite,” he added.

Carlsen said Gukesh has to take the initiative from the start to keep Sindarov on the back foot.

“If Sindarov is ahead early on, it’s probably very, very bad news for Gukesh. If Gukesh is ahead early on, he automatically becomes a significant favourite. That’s how these matches work.”

Talking about his personal career, Carlsen said he now prefers rapid chess to classical chess.

“I think in terms of their chess styles, the current generation, I don’t know if they’re making conscious choices about it, but they’re doing very well, for sure. In that sense, chess is in very good hands with the kids.

“It depends on the tournament. Honestly, I was excited here to experiment a little bit, and that is certainly fun. I think it’s an important step for chess to rate slightly faster games as classical. We kind of have needed a more universal system of rating every tournament game for a long time. Attempts have been made, but it’s always been that the classical rating has been the gold standard,” he said.

“Every tournament that doesn’t have a classical rating for certain people matters less for this reason. I’m happy that Total Chess can both be classically rated and be a mix of formats that makes it harder for people to master weaknesses,” he added.

Carlsen said that after becoming a father, he decided to give up the classical format.

“I think after I became a father as well, it made even more certain for me that I was never coming back to the classical World Championship.

“There are so many things that I like about chess. There are a lot of tournaments that I like. Classical, especially the classroom tournaments are classical. Maybe not as steady a diet, but at least once in a while,” he said.

“It’s hard to imagine me completely stepping away from competitive chess and not being good at it. That’s because I like it. I love it. My son is the greatest human being alive. It’s fantastic. It’s a joy.”