World Rapid & Blitz: Arjun's Narrow Path to Candidates

While India's newly crowned world champion soaks in the celebrations, it's now hustle time for his peers to attempt to fight him for the title two years from now.

- HT Correspondent

BENGALURU: Leading that pack is India's highest-ranked player, world No. 4 Arjun Erigaisi.

The 21-year-old is currently placed second on the Fide circuit leaderboard – one of the pathways to qualify for the Candidates. Arjun is six points behind America's Fabiano Caruana in the Fide circuit and both players will feature in the year-end $1.5 million World rapid and blitz tournament in New York City's Wall Street, that runs till December 31. Whoever tops the Fide circuit standings will directly qualify for the Candidates – the eight-player tournament that determines who will challenge reigning world champion D Gukesh in the 2026 World Championship match.