In a historic moment, India’s Divya Deshmukh has defeated Koneru Humpy in the final of the FIDE Women’s Chess World Cup. The clash between the two was forced into a tiebreaker. Deshmukh had already made history by becoming the first Indian to ever reach the final of the FIDE Women’s World Cup 2025, and she has further established herself in history by defeating Humpy in the final.
Humpy put up a good fight against the 19-year-old; however, Divya’s resilience forced the veteran to retire on move 75. It is worth noting that Deshmukh triumphed in the second rapid game after the first game was drawn.
With Humpy making a mistake in the final stages of the game, Divya was quick to capitalise and make the most of the opportunity presented to her. With her win, the 19-year-old becomes India’s fourth female Grandmaster after Humpy, R. Vaishali, and Harika Dronavalli.
It is interesting to note that Deshmukh has achieved the Grandmaster title in a non-conventional way. Generally, becoming a Grandmaster requires a player to win three GM norms and achieve a standard FIDE rating of 2500 or above. In Divya’s case
Divya Deshmukh opens up on winning the FIDE Women’s Chess World Cup
The 19-year-old was quite emotional after winning the title. After the win, she took centre stage and talked about the areas she needs to improve upon and hoped that she could go on to achieve quite a lot in her career.
"I definitely need to learn endgames. I am pretty sure at some point I messed it up. I need time to process it. I think it was fate that I get the GM title this way. Before this tournament, I didn't even have one norm. It definitely means a lot. There's a lot more to achieve. I'm hoping this is just the start,” Deshmukh was quoted as saying by ESPN.
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