Nineteen Seconds on the Clock: Divya Deshmukh Wins the World Cup

Illustration of Divya Deshmukh at the chessboard. This is not a real picture of her, and the board shown is not a position from a real game.

Let us start with a puzzle. It is White's move in the position below. Black's pawn on f4 stands on the same row as White's rook, and nothing guards it. Should White take it? Think about the black pawn on a5 before you answer. You will meet this position in the game below.

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White to move. White's rook on a4 can take the black pawn on f4. Black has a rook on a6 behind a pawn on a5. Should White take on f4?

Analyze this position in the full game

The player with White was Humpy Koneru, an Indian grandmaster since 2002. The player with Black was Divya Deshmukh, a 19-year-old from Nagpur, India. It was the last game of the final of the 2025 Women's World Cup, in Batumi, Georgia.

A Girl Who Won World Titles

Divya Deshmukh was born on 9 December 2005. She started winning early.

• In 2014 she shared first place in the World Youth Championship for girls under 10, and won the title on tiebreak.
• In 2017 she won the World Youth Championship for girls under 12.
• In 2024 she became the World Junior Champion, the world title for girls under 20.
• At the 2024 Chess Olympiad in Budapest, India's women won the team gold medal for the first time. Divya scored 9½ points from 11 games and won the individual gold medal on her board.

The World Cup

In July 2025 she played the Women's World Cup in Batumi, a knockout tournament where players meet in short matches. She reached the final against Humpy Koneru.

Both normal games of the final were draws. The winner would come from two rapid tiebreak games, where each player has 15 minutes, plus 10 more seconds for every move. The first rapid game was a draw too. The second game is the one below.

Before the World Cup, Divya was an International Master, one step below grandmaster. Winning the World Cup made her a grandmaster straight away. Afterwards she said that "before this I didn't even have one norm, and now I'm a Grandmaster." A norm is one of the strong results a player usually needs to collect on the way to the title.

The Game: Humpy Koneru vs. Divya Deshmukh, Women's World Cup 2025

Humpy Koneru 0-1 Divya Deshmukh Women's World Cup 2025 · Batumi · Final, tiebreak game 2 (rapid) White: Humpy Koneru · Black: Divya Deshmukh

A quiet start

The game began as a Catalan Opening. Black took a pawn on c4 on move 4, and from then on Black was a pawn ahead for most of the game.

1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 Nf6 4.g3 dxc4 5.Bg2 Bb4+ 6.Bd2 a5 7.Qc2 Bxd2+ 8.Nbxd2 b5 9.a4 c6 10.b3 cxb3 11.Nxb3 O-O 12.O-O Ba6 13.Nc5 bxa4 14.Nxa6 Rxa6

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Position after 14...Rxa6, with White to move. White still has a bishop on g2 and Black has none. Black has two more pawns, and White's next move, 15.Rxa4, wins one of them back.

Analyze this position in the full game

15.Rxa4 Nbd7 16.Rfa1 Qb6 17.Nd2 Rfa8 18.e3 Nd5 19.Nc4 Qc7 20.Qd2 N5b6 21.Nxb6 Qxb6 22.Qc3 Nf6 23.Rc1 Nd5 24.Bxd5 exd5 25.Rca1 h6 26.Kg2 Qb5 27.h3 Qb6 28.R1a2 Qc7 29.Qc5 Qa7 30.Qc3 Qb6 31.Rb2 Qd8 32.Rba2 h5 33.h4 g6 34.Ra1 Qb6 35.Kg1 Kg7 36.Kg2 Qd8 37.Qc5 R8a7 38.R1a2 Ra8 39.Ra1 Qc7

For the first 39 moves our own Stockfish 17.1 run, at depth 22, kept the game within half a pawn of level, even with Black a pawn up. Both players moved their pieces around and waited.

White opens the center

40.e4 dxe4 41.d5 Qe5 42.Rd1 cxd5 43.Rxd5 Qe8 44.Qd4+ Kg8 45.Re5 Qc6 46.Qxe4 Qxe4+ 47.Rexe4 Rf6 48.Re5 Rf5 49.Rxf5 gxf5

White broke open the center with 40.e4 and 41.d5. Our engine marks 41.d5 as a mistake that gave Black an edge of more than two pawns. Divya gave most of it back at once with 42...cxd5. The queens came off on move 46, then one pair of rooks, and the game was level again.

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Position after 49...gxf5, with White to move. Each side has one rook and its king. Black has four pawns, on a5, f7, f5 and h5. White has three, on f2, g3 and h4.

Analyze this position in the full game

Each player had one rook left. This is a rook endgame, and rook endgames come up in chess all the time. Black had an extra pawn, but our engine called the position equal.

The pawn grab

50.Kf3 Kg7 51.Kf4 Kg6 52.Ke5 Ra6 53.Kd5 f4

Now we are at the puzzle. White's rook on a4 can take the pawn on f4. It looks like a free pawn. But look at Black's other pawn, on a5. It is a passed pawn: no white pawn can stop it on its way to a1. And Black's rook on a6 stands right behind it.

54.Rxf4 a4 55.Rb4 a3 56.Rb1 Kf5 57.f3 a2 58.Ra1 Ra3

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Position after 58...Ra3, with White to move. Black's pawn on a2 is one step from becoming a queen. Black's rook on a3 stands behind it. White's rook on a1 has to sit in front of the pawn and guard a1.

Analyze this position in the full game

The answer to the puzzle is no. Our engine finds three king moves that keep the game level: 54.Ke4, 54.Kd4 and 54.Kc4. After 54.Rxf4, the a-pawn ran, and our engine had Black better by more than four pawns. White's rook had to go back to a1 to stop the pawn. There it could only wait, while Black's rook behind the pawn was free to move along the a-file and Black's king was free to go after White's pawns.

Humpy had 19 seconds left on her clock after 54.Rxf4. Divya had almost three minutes.

Up and down

59.Kd4 f6 60.Kd5 Ra4 61.Kd6 Ra5 62.Ke7 Ra6 63.Kd7 Ke5 64.g4 Ra7+ 65.Kc6 Kf4 66.gxh5 Kxf3 67.h6 f5 68.Kd5 f4

Rapid chess is hard, and both players were short of time. Divya's 65...Kf4 let White back into the game: our engine had it close to level again. Then 67.h6 swung it back to Black, and 67...f5 swung it back to level. One move decided it.

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Position after 68...f4, with White to move. White's pawn on h6 is two steps from the end. Black's rook on a7 can move along the seventh row. What should White play?

Analyze this position in the full game

69.h7 Rxh7 70.Rxa2 Kg3 71.Ra8 Rxh4 72.Rg8+ Rg4 73.Rf8 f3 74.Ke5 f2 75.Rf7 Kg2

In the position above, our engine's choice is 69.Ke5, which keeps the game about level. Humpy pushed 69.h7, and Divya's rook took the pawn along the seventh row. White won Black's a-pawn with 70.Rxa2, but Black's king and f-pawn were already too far up the board. After 75...Kg2, the f-pawn stood one step from becoming a queen, and the game ended there with a win for Divya.

What to Learn from This Game

• A free pawn is not always free. 54.Rxf4 took a pawn and let a more dangerous pawn run.
• Rooks belong behind passed pawns. Black's rook stood behind the a-pawn and pushed it forward. White's rook had to stand in front of it, and could only wait.
• In a rook endgame, kings fight too. Divya's king walked all the way to f3 and g2 to help her last pawn.
• Watch your clock. In rapid games, the player with more time can think, and the player with less time has to guess.

A Position to Try

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Divya's game, after 66.gxh5, with Black to move. Black's king is next to White's pawn on f3. Divya took it with 66...Kxf3. What happens to White's pawn on h5 now?

Analyze this position in the full game

Divya took with 66...Kxf3. Our engine slightly prefers 66...Ke5, but both keep the game about level. White's h-pawn ran to h6, and the game swung back and forth until move 69, as you saw above. Count the steps each pawn needs to reach the last row, and you will see why both sides had to hurry.

A Champion Who Started Young

Divya Deshmukh won world titles as a girl and the World Cup at 19. In the last game of the final, the position was level for the first 39 moves. It turned on one pawn grab with 19 seconds on the clock, and Divya's passed pawn and active rook did the rest.