Total Chess Day 5: Carlsen Is Out, and Praggnanandhaa Blunders Mate in One

Some days at a tournament are quiet, and some days produce a moment that people will be showing each other for years. Saturday in Budapest, the fifth day of the Total Chess Pilot, was the second kind.

In Rounds 7 and 8, the story was not one thing but several, and they all point toward a Sunday that will decide who moves on and who goes home.

Carlsen's two draws

Start with the headline. Magnus Carlsen played Shakhriyar Mamedyarov twice and drew both games. In most tournaments, that would be an unremarkable day. In this one, it ended his chances of winning his group. At best, he can now finish second in Group C, and only the four group winners advance to the title knockout.

He is also still winless in the fast-classical section. That is not a sentence anyone expected to write about Carlsen at the start of the event, and it gives the whole tournament an unusual feeling. The player who has defined the top of the sport for so long is playing out the string while others fight for the places that matter.

Group C itself has shifted. Anish Giri now leads after beating Abhimanyu Mishra, which puts him in position to take the group on Sunday. It is a good result for a player who has often been described as the best in the world at not losing, and a reminder that being hard to beat is its own kind of weapon in a format like this.

The blunder

Then there is the moment that will be replayed. Praggnanandhaa, in a winning position against Richard Rapport, blundered a mate in one. The move that would have ended things for him was 43.Qg7#, a checkmate that was available to him. He missed it.

I want to be careful here, because the temptation is to treat a moment like this as a joke. It isn't. Every strong player has missed something obvious at some point, usually under time pressure and usually when they were sure they were winning. The reason it hurts so much

is that it is the moment when the mind relaxes. You see that the position is won, and some part of you stops working as hard.

In this case, the consequences were immediate. It was his third defeat in seven fast-classical games, and over the event he has dropped 18 Elo. His title hopes are over. A clip of the moment, from chess24, circulated widely on Nov 14, and I understand why. It is the kind of thing that makes people feel both sympathy and a strange kind of relief, because it reminds them that the elite are human.

What I'd say to anyone tempted to pile on: the format is brutal. Fast classical gives players enough time to feel the weight of every decision and not enough to double-check every line. A player of Praggnanandhaa's quality will recover. But the lesson for the rest of us is the old one: before you play the clever move, check whether the simple one ends the game.

Group D, wide open

While that was happening, Group D tightened into a three-way knot. Arjun Erigaisi beat Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, leaving Arjun, MVL and Hans Niemann tied on 13 points. MVL still sits on top of the group on the strength of his blitz-tiebreaker performance, which means he has a small edge going into the final day, but the margin is thin enough that a single result could reshape the standings.

This is the kind of situation that creates good chess and bad nerves. Three players on the same score, each knowing that a draw might not be enough, and the tiebreak system looming in the background. The final rounds will be played with the math very much on everyone's mind.

The other groups

In Group B, Fabiano Caruana is on 16 points, four clear of Le, and is nearly uncatchable. In Group A, Alireza Firouzja still leads, with Jorden van Foreest climbing behind him. And Vincent Keymer recorded his first win of the event, beating Vladislav Artemiev in a time scramble, which is a good reminder that even a player who has struggled can find a result when the clock gets low.

Carlsen remains world No. 1 on live ratings after Caruana's two draws. That is a detail worth keeping in mind, because the gap between them is narrow, and the final day will decide whether it stays that way.

Sunday, and only the winners

The final group rounds, Rounds 9 and 10, are on Sunday, Nov 15. Only the four group winners advance. That makes the last day simple in structure and brutal in practice: win your group or go home.

Group B looks settled. Groups A and C have clear leaders but still have enough games left for surprises. Group D is a genuine fight. If I had to pick the most interesting thing to watch, it would be Group D, where three players are tied and the tiebreak is doing real work.

It is also worth watching how the players who are out of contention handle the day. Some will play freely and produce beautiful games. Others will play flat. Carlsen, who has been in this position rarely, will be the most-watched example.

The takeaway

If you want one sentence to remember about Day 5, it is this: the tournament is being decided not by the strongest players but by the ones who avoid the bad moment. Carlsen's draws, Praggnanandhaa's blunder and Giri's steady win are all versions of the same story. In fast classical, the margin between a win and a disaster is often a single move. Sunday will show who can stay calm enough to find it.

Photo credit

Praggnanandhaa in 2025. Photo by Frans Peeters, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3APraggnanandhaa_in_2025.jpg https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0