 "Koneru Humpy and R Vaishali are among the Indians still alive in the 2025 FIDE Women's World Cup in Batumi, Georgia. Image credit: FIDE")
The third edition of the FIDE Women’s World Cup is halfway through with the fourth round of the competition set to get underway from Wednesday. The 107-player tournament got underway on 6 July and has been running non-stop until Tuesday, the first ‘Free Day’ in the itinerary.
And out of the 16 players who will be in action in the fourth round that starts on Wednesday, four are Indians. Grandmasters Koneru Humpy, Harika Dronavalli, R Vaishali and International Master Divya Deshmukh have kept the tricolour flying high so far in Batumi, Georgia, and each of them will be hopeful of going the distance in the tournament in order to qualify for next year’s Candidates Tournament.
The top three finishers in the ongoing World Cup, after all, will book their place in the eight-player tournament next year. And with four Indians still in the competition, there’s hope that at least a couple of them book their places via the World Cup route, if not through other methods.
Ahead of the fourth round of the 2025 Women’s Chess World Cup, we take a look at how all the Indians in action have fared so far in the tournament, including the ones knocked out in the third round and earlier:
Still in contention: Koneru Humpy, Harika Dronavalli, R Vaishali and Divya Deshmukh
Each of the four Indians still in the competition were among the top 21 seeds who had received a first-round bye and went straight into the second round.
Vaishali was brought in as a replacement for Kazakhstan’s Bibisara Assaubayeva after the latter withdrew from the tournament, and started her campaign with a 2-0 victory over Canada’s Maili-Jade Ouellet before facing stiffer competition from USA’s Carissa Yip, who held her to four consecutive draws before the 24-year-old prevailed in the tie-breaks.
Harika, meanwhile, started her campaign with a victory over PV Nandhidhaa in an all-Indian clash – beating her in the second game after the first one ended in a draw. And like Vaishali, Harika played out four consecutive stalemates in her third-round meeting, with Greece’s Stavroula Tsolakidou, before advancing with back-to-back wins in the 10+10 rapid games.
Humpy, the top-seeded Indian in the tournament at fourth, and Divya have had relatively simpler routes to the fourth round, winning both of their matches so far by 1.5-0.5 scorelines and not playing a single tie-break game so far.
Reigning women’s rapid world champion Humpy defeated Uzbekistan’s Afruza Khamdamova in the second round followed by Klaudia Kulon in the third. Divya, on the other hand, has defeated Georgia’s Kesaria Mgeladze and Serbia’s Teodora Injac in the second and third round respectively.
Eliminated: Vantika Agrawal, PV Nandhidhaa, Priyanka K, Priya Rout and Kiran Manisha Mohanty
Vantika’s performance has been one of the highlights of the tournament so far, even if she bowed out with a 3.5-2.5 defeat against seventh-seeded Russian GM Kateryna Lagno in the third round.
The 23-year-old International Master, after all, had stunned former world champion Anna Ushenina 4.5-3.5 in the second round in a major upset, beating the Ukrainian in the opening Classical game and eventually prevailing in the tie-breaks after her opponent fought back.
Vantika had earlier opened her campaign with a 1.5-0.5 victory over Turkmenistan’s Lala Shohradova.
The trio of Nandidhaa, Priyanka and Priya bowed out in the second round – Nandidhaa losing to compatriot Harika and Priyanka and Priya losing against Kulon and Alexandra Kosteniuk respectively.
Kiran was the only Indian to bow out in the first round after she lost to China’s Song Yuxin 1.5-0.5.