Praggnanandhaa and Gukesh share the lead going into the final round of the Tata Steel Masters - 12

The twelfth round of the Tata Steel Masters saw the top three all involved in dramatic games. At the end of the day Praggnanandhaa and Gukesh share the lead on 8.5/12 and Nodirbek Abdusattorov is now on 7.5 points after losing. If they are tied tomorrow there will be a blitz tie-break match after the round.

First of all Praggnanandhaa won a short game against Alexey Sarana whose solid undefeated start is a distant memory after his third loss in a row. Praggnanandhaa found a clever idea in the Queen's Gambit that led to opposite sides castling and a nasty position for Sarana. Praggnanandhaa broke through with a knight sacrifice and Sarana allowed him to finish with a Queen sacrifice. Gukesh no doubt felt obliged to try and win against Jorden Van Foreest and he was comfortable at one stage. Then the game entered a time scramble where Gukesh thought he might be losing (he wasn't) but just after time control he played 42...Rb1?! (42...Rxh3 was a complicated win) missing that white had 45.Ke4. Calculating such a position is very complicated and shortly after Van Foreest was winning according to the engines but he missed something and after 47.Rxe3 the game finished in a draw. Abdusattorov had a miserable time against Arjun Erigaisi, he was slightly worse out of the opening and then lost after 24...Qg5? Erigaisi overcomplicated things and let much of the advantage go with 32.Rxc6? (32.Rg6!) but it was still complicated and after 36...Rf8? 37.Qg2 Erigaisi was winning again and there were no more mistakes.

Vladimir Fedoseev took advantage of a one move blunder (30.Qb3?? Rf6!) to beat Max Warmerdam, Leon Luke Mendonca missed a chance 36.Rxd7! to go into a very favourable knight ending against Fabiano Caruana before drawing, Pentala Harikrishna and Vincent Keymer drew in a Catalan and Wei Yi and Anish Giri blitzed to a draw in a Petroff that was the first game to finish.

In the Challengers Erwin L'Ami survived a lost position against Kazybek Nogerbek and his draw allowed him to share the lead with Thai Dai Van Nguyen who beat the suffering Irina Bulmaga today, and finally Aydin Suleymanli (who plays Bulmaga tomorrow) beat Frederik Svane to catch both of them too. All these leaders are on 8.5/12.

My thanks to Michiel Abeln for the photos.

Masters Round 12 Standings: 1st= Praggnanandhaa, Gukesh 8.5pts, 3rd Abdusattorov 7.5pts, 4th Fedoseev 7pts, 5th= Giri, Wei Yi 6.5pts, 7th= Caruana, Harikrishna 6pts, 9th= Sarana, Van Foreest, Keymer 5pts, 12th= Erigaisi, Mendonca 4.5pts, 14th Warmerdam 3.5pts,

Round 13 on Feb 2nd at 11.00 GMT Gukesh vs Erigaisi, Giri vs Van Foreest, Fedoseev vs Wei Yi Caruana vs Warmerdam, Sarana vs Mendonca, Keymer vs Praggnanandhaa, Abdusattorov vs Harikrishna,

Challengers Round 12 Standings: 1st= Suleymanli, L'Ami, Nguyen 8.5pts, 4th Bok 8pts, 5th= Yakubboev, Svane, Gurel 7pts, 8th Nogerbek 6.5pts, 9th Lu 5.5pts, 10th= Pijpers, Vaishali 5pts, 12th Oro 3.5pts, 13th Divya 3pts, 14th Bulmaga 1pt,

Round 13 Feb 02 at 12.00 Lu vs Yakubboev, Nogerbek vs Oro, Vaishali vs L'Ami, Svane vs Gurel, Bulmaga vs Suleymanli, Bok vs Nguyen, Pijpers vs Divya,

Tienkamp Round 8 of 9 Standings: 1st= Panesar, Slagboom 5.5pts, 3rd Grutter 5pts, 4th Tudor 4.5pts, 5th Smeets 4pts, 6th= Beukema, Sofronie 3.5pts, 8th= Lohia, Holzke 3pts, 10th Zwirs 2.5pts.