India Grandmaster Dommaraju Gukesh tried his best but could not overcome a resilient Ding Liren of China and had to settle for a draw after 68 moves in the 13th and penultimate game of the World Chess Championship here on Wednesday.

With the scores tied at 6.5-6.5 and only one game of classical chess to go, it is likely that the match will be extended to the tie-break stage where games of shorter duration will decide the winner.

As was expected, the 18-year-old Gukesh went for the King pawn on his opening move and yet again faced defending champion Ding’s first-choice opening in French defence.

The Chinese spent a lot of time in the opening phase of the game when Gukesh came out with a novel idea early, but it was clear right from the beginning that there was little for the white.

The middle game saw the exchange of a couple of minor pieces that gave Gukesh’s white only a small advantage optically.

And as the game progressed, it was clear that the exchange of pawns on the queen side will only lead to an equal endgame.

Gukesh, knowing fully well that this could be his last chance with the favourable colour, left no stone unturned as he kept looking for more but Ding kept his cool and traded pieces when necessary to reach a queen-plus-rook endgame that was just level.

The players, nevertheless, fought on for a long time.

The pieces changed hands, and eventually, it was a queen and rook plus pawns on the board.

Gukesh tried everything in the book to keep pushing for more, even in the theoretical drawn endgame, but Ding was up to the task.

The game was eventually drawn to a two versus three rook-and-pawns endgame, and Gukesh played on till there was no life left in the position.

Ding held fort till the very end and will go into the last game of the match as the favourite.

Gukesh said after the extremely tense game that things are really getting exciting as the championship enters the most crucial phase.

When asked how he was feeling with just one game left before the tie-break of shorter duration kicks in to determine the winner, Gukesh said: “As close as the match gets, it only gets exciting. Quite excited (about the 14th game), but of course, it’s an important game. I will try to do my best.

“As the games get less and less, there is more at stake, obviously. I came for a fight, I was feeling fresh (today), I was feeling confident.

“And I also had this cool idea prepared, so I was quite excited to play,” added Gukesh.

Ding conceded he was “very tired” after the game.

“Firstly, very tired after a long game.

“Secondly, I need to decide what’s the strategy for the next game, it’s a golden game,” said the defending champion.

Now, to clinch the championship, either player will need to muster nothing short of a win over the other.

But, in the case that both players end up drawing Game 14 as well, there will be a tiebreak where a series of Rapid games, four games to be specific, will commence to decide the champion.

PTI