The video provides a live, play‑by‑play commentary of the board‑4 clash between Alexander Donchenko (Germany) and Gukesh Dommaraju (India) at the 2026 Chess Olympiad, interwoven with pre‑game context about team line‑ups and tournament standings. The commentators walk through the opening (a Nimzo‑Indian‑type line after 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 d5 4.Nc3 Nc6 5.Bb4), highlight key strategic ideas, and narrate the complex middlegame where Donchenko builds a material advantage. As the game progresses, Gukesh demonstrates tenacity, finding tactical resources (notably a knight fork on f4 and a decisive queen sacrifice) that turn a losing position into a winning one, ultimately forcing Donchenko’s resignation. The post‑game segment features an on‑site interview with Gukesh, where he reflects on the critical moment (the missed …B e2 and the missed …N f4 by Donchenko), his mindset during the comeback, and the significance of the win for Team India’s gold‑medal hopes. The video concludes with reactions from commentators and a brief look at the team’s standing after the match.
Chapters
Welcome everyone to the all-important 9th round clash. We have the German team entering in— Vincent Keimer, Matthias Blubaum, Alexander Donchenko— as they take on Team India. You see Gukesh entering in with his trainer Jagosh Gajewski and Nihal Sarin with his trainer Sethuraman. It's Gukesh versus Alexander Donchenko on board number 4. A handshake there. Very important clash from the tournament standings perspective. Germany currently leading the tournament along with Uzbekistan on 14 match points, while India is one match point behind. We have Prag and Vincent Keimer on board one. On board two, it is Arjun Erigaisi versus Matthias Bluebaum. On board three, Nihal Sarin takes on Frederic Swanner and Gukesh, the world champion. Takes on Alexander Donchenko on the 4th board. A very important clash for Team India as Gukesh is the small favorite, but he has the black pieces. A handshake here. Let's see what Donchenko opens the game with. And this, dear friends, is the binary game of the day. Check out the description for the link. Pawn to d4 by Donchenko. Well, that's his main repertoire.
He pushes his pawn to d4 and Gukesh brings his knight out to f6. And Donchenko is known for his active play, at the same time is quite solid as well. Pawn to c4. And Gukesh sticks to what he knows the best, that is e6. In order to play the Queen's Gambit Declined setup with pawn to d5. Donchenko brings his knight out to f3, and Gukesh now can go d5, which is what he usually does. But here he brings his knight to c6, slightly tricky move. Because, you know, you're not putting out a pawn, you're trying to attack here with your knight, you're not capturing the center. Knight goes to c3, and now Gukesh goes bishop to b4. So in some ways, this has transposed into a Nimzo-Indian with the knight to c6 variation. In queen c2 line. He takes on c3, and you can take back with the pawn as well, but Donchenko remains solid. He takes back with the queen, and Gukesh quickly castles. You can see the choice of the opening that Gukesh has gone for is to lead him to a fighting Game.
Slightly non-standard, so his opponent has to think.
For example, should he go Bishop g5, e3, g3? Many possibilities here. He goes for g3 variation, which is quite logical. And Gukesh goes Knight e4, Queen c2, d5, Bishop to g2, and pawn to a5. Donchenko castles, and you have pawn to a4. The rook comes to d1, and Gukesh brings his knight back to d6 in order to make the c4 pawn take a decision. Pawn comes up to c5, and Gukesh now jumps with the knight to f5. This is getting quite exciting. e3 played by Donchenko. The bishop on c8 is quite passive, and he goes pawn to f6. We have bishop d2. The idea of f6 is at some point maybe to go e5. It would be too difficult to engineer it because the d5 pawn would get weak, but Maybe g5, h5 could be on the cards. Bishop comes out to c3 and Gukesh goes Ne7. We have queen coming to e2 and queen e8. The bishop drops back to f1. Slowly and steadily the position is building up. There's been only one trade in the position. Knight comes to c6. I mean, the idea was to get the bishop to b5, but Donchenko stopped it. And now Ne1 played. We have Na7, the knight comes to d3. Na7, the idea was to get bishop to b5, and Gukesh does play bishop b5. b3, and the knight comes back to c6. Now, this tension with the a4 pawn and the b3 pawn is quite interesting because should Gukesh take it, should he not take it, is the big question here. He avoids it. He plays queen to f7. This is where the position starts to get very intense. Queen f3, he's threatening to take twice and win the pawn. But Gukesh simply ignores it. He goes g5. Point is that here he wants to maybe gain space, and bishop goes back to f1. Because notice, if you take here, take here, the light squares do get a bit weakened. And taking that into consideration, he goes bishop f1. Knight to e7, and now Donchenko can take on a4 once again, but I think Gukesh would simply double down on the a-file. So he goes Rook e1. It's clear that white is aiming for e4 break. If white manages to get the e4 break successfully, the e6 pawn would be tremendously weak. Ra7, Gukesh trying to double up on the a-file. And Donchenko comes back. Queen to d1. We have the rook doubling on the a-file. While this does feel like black is making progress, Gukesh is also just getting his pieces on the queenside where they could be slightly away from the scene of action in the center and on the kingside. So you have rook ad1, king to h8, and bishop g2. Finally, pawn takes pawn has happened. Look at the clock, by the way. Donchenko has 8 minutes, Gukesh has 18 minutes. At this point, it does feel like Gukesh is the one who Who's pressing because rook comes into a2. Queen goes back. Are there certain tactics here? Not really. Knight to c6, and he goes knight c1, kicking the rook out from a2. The rook has to go back to a3, and queen comes up to b2. King g8, he makes his king go away from the diagonal here, but Donchenko now gets the pawn push ahead. You can't take, by the way, on e4. It's very important. He goes back with the knight because if you take Bishop takes d5 is coming. This opens up. This opens up. That's lost. So he goes knight e7, ed, ed. Now look at these two rooks. They have no point of entry. Meanwhile, the white rook enters in rook e6, putting pressure just about everywhere. And Gukesh. Simply goes queen to f5, keeps an eye on the e6 rook. Rook d1, and the king comes up to f7. I don't know if Gukesh wishes to take twice here. Maybe he does. But Donchenko prevents it anyway by coming back with the rook. Now white is clearly better. Gukesh goes h5, but it weakens his king even further. The h pawn can become a weakness. You can attack it with queen e2. He goes bishop f3, a very good move. This is an excellent move because you attack the pawn, and after g4, you want to go bishop d1 to c2 and take this long diagonal. That would be so epic. And Donchenko is playing this like a genius. He plays bishop d1. h4 played by Gukesh. He's trying for some activity with Queen h5 and rook h8. But 40th move, last move before time control, and the best move is f3, opening up the position. I wonder if Donchenko will find it. See, if he does, Gukesh is in big trouble. He's thinking, and he finds it. Pawn to f3. And now Gukesh has to make his final move before the Time gets added. He takes on f3, but look at this, the position is -3 here for Gukesh, like he's losing completely. Meanwhile, the other games are just equal right now, so India is on the verge of losing to Germany. Donchenko comes back, takes on f3. He has 27 minutes now to work this out. A +4 position is what he has. One thing that Gukesh does insanely well is defend inferior positions. So if you are playing against him, you want to finish him off as soon as possible. You Should put your maximum energy here, but we are already in fourth hour of play, maybe even fifth. Queen goes to f2, putting pressure on the f6 point. And now rook h8. Gukesh tries to get some play with the h-file with his rook. And now Donchenko plays a move that is beautiful—
g4.
And the very nice point is that if you take here, I simply go King h1, my rook is coming in, Rook takes f6, and it's winning. So Gukesh moving his rook here, he comes back, Rook a6. Makes sense because the rook will defend along the third rank. And he goes knight to d3. One of the ideas could be to give a check. And Gukesh takes the knight. He's like, let's get rid of the knight. Rook takes d3. And once again, taking the pawn is now impossible. The bishop defends it. It's a very tough position. The knights have no real good square.
He goes h3.
This is one of those moves you make and hope that in future it would come in handy. b4, b5 is just a killer idea, but Donchenko makes the step— first step in the wrong direction. He goes rook e3. Nothing really is like affected at this point, but there were bit better ideas with, as we said, b4, b5, maybe getting the bishop via this diagonal. And Gukesh now has to decide what to do. He can go knight d8, knight e6. But he plays knight to g6. He brings his knight to the g6 square, hoping that his knight would come to f4. And Donchenko takes this pawn. A mistake. Taking this pawn was wrong. Rook e1 going back was correct, or rook g3, but takes the pawn. Now, Gukesh, you can see he already feels the energy in the position. There's this Hawkeye Gukesh which is looking to make a comeback. Now, why is this move bad? Well, it's because of tactics. Rook takes h3, rook takes h3, and there is a very nice move, queen c1. Let's see if Gukesh finds it.
He does.
Now this is hanging. Bishop on c3 is a bit loose. Only the rook protects it. He comes back, queen f1. And now Gukesh goes king g7, a very useful move, tucking the king away from the f-file. Rook comes to f3. Tries to improve his position, and rook enters it for one pawn. Black has excellent compensation now. Bishop e2, a big error, big error. But Gukesh has to spot this wonderful knight jump. Can he do it? It's a knight fork in the position. Donchenko simply wants to trade queens and. Try to milk the pawn up position. He might have considered Queen c2, he might have considered the queen going back, but he hasn't considered Knight f4. What a move! If queen takes queen, Knight e2 is hanging with a check. And Rook takes f4 played, and now Gukesh can simply pick up the bishop. He takes on c3, and the problem now is d4 is weak. Queen e3 coming, the bishop would hang. Too many loose things, too many. He goes back bishop to d1, and now we have queen to e3 check. He gives a check. If rook f2, you can simply pick up these pawns. Everything would be pinned. So Donchenko goes King h1, and now the final nail in the coffin, Queen d2 attacking h2. And if you protect it, the f4 rook is hanging, and it's game over here. You can see Donchenko there, he has lost the interest in the position. He's about to give up. Ah, that is so painful here. He played the entire game so well, but Gukesh, like a phoenix that rises from the dead, has risen from the ashes and is totally winning here. And with this, it not only wins the game but also the match India versus Germany. You can see Donchenko there in disbelief. He cannot believe what has just happened here. His position was so good, and not seeing a way out, he resigns. Gukesh wins, and observe Gukesh's expressions here. You will see first Srinath comes in with a pat on the back, and Gukesh—well, there you see—he is.
Like, let's get out of here.
That was an intense game, and really heart goes out to Donchenko, who played so well and was so close to getting the win for his team, very close to glory, but has to now suffer here because he couldn't win a winning position. Meanwhile, Gukesh showed his tenacity like he always does. Did not give up until the very end and was rewarded by the full point. This means that India still keep their chances to win the gold medal in the tournament. They are now in joint second position behind Uzbekistan, and congratulations to Gukesh and Team India. We leave you with some of the footage outside the playing hall when Gukesh exited.
I'm here with world champion Gukesh Domaraju, who just made such a comeback to win his game against Donchenko. I mean, this is such an important game for India versus Germany because Germany did beat Uzbekistan, you know, in the league. But let's go through this game because it looked worse for you and then you turned the tides and won this game. So take me to the point where you thought that it was most critical.
Yeah, I think, uh, and he went Bishop e2 and he again missed Knight f4.
Double X-clam, by the way, Knight f4.
Yeah, very nice. And, uh, yeah, I think here it's just collapsing for white.
Why childhood Bukesh? He used to get into bad positions quite often.
Bukesh, was this magic or was it something else? Everybody I talked to says in order to win the Olympiad gold, you need to play really well, have a little bit of luck. Today felt like you created some luck. Do you feel like this is the kind of game you need to win to finish at the top of the podium?
Congratulations to you. Sorry, sorry, please.
Just one question. G five, how did you assess? I mean, incredible. You played G five, yeah? You played G five. It was probably not a great one. It was amazing.
But कुकेश first. Sorry.
Oh my God!
Ena ena ena ena. Abi o kolu koyuyoruz, kolu koyuyoruz. Yo yo yo çileci. Aa ne de çası. Kolu koyuyoruz. Şurada gençler kaldırabiliriz seni. E video kanatası değil mi? Oldu oldu oldu. Thank you. Can I also have one, please?
