World No.1 Magnus Carlsen suffered an embarrassing defeat to reigning world champion D Gukesh in Round 6 of the Grand Chess Tour. Ahead of their clash, Carlsen made a bizarre statement, saying that he would approach the game against Gukesh as if he were playing a weaker player; however, things backfired as Magnus was stunned by Gukesh in the rapid format. The win was Gukesh's fifth in a row, and it helped him take the sole lead.

After the defeat, Carlsen said that he hasn't been at his best in the tournament and was soundly punished by Gukesh.

"No, I've played kind of poorly the whole tournament and this time I got soundly punished. I think I had a very, very nice position. He took his chance to open up a position with c6. After that it was a little bit , like earlier, where I get short of time. I can't really handle it that well. And he found a lot of really, really good moves. And I think he did that part very well. I think I had one kind of last chance at some point to bail out to something that was very draw-ish. And I thought, well, let's continue playing. And then a couple of minutes later, I was pretty hopelessly lost. So, it was poor, but all credit to Gukesh. He's playing well and he's taking his chances too,” Magnus said to Take Take Take.

Magnus had also said that Gukesh hasn't done anything incredible in rapid and blitz format to show that he would do well in the tournament, however, after being humbled by the Indian Grandmaster he took a U-turn on his remark and lauded Gukesh's five wins in a row, calling it no mean feat.

“Yeah, he's doing incredibly well. incredibly well now. So, you know, it's a long way to go in the tournament, but, you know, winning five games in a row is no mean feat.

Magnus further said that he is not enjoying playing chess at the moment.

“Honestly, I am not enjoying playing chess at all right now. I don't feel any flow at all when I'm playing. I'm constantly hesitating, and it's just really poor right now,” he further added.

Carlsen and Gukesh will play two more matches in the blitz format, where the Norwegian will look to bounce back and seek revenge for the defeat.