Indian Grandmaster R Praggnanandhaa ended his run of draws to beat Wesley So of the USA in the penultimate round of the Superbet Chess Classic to take a sole lead in Bucharest, Romania, on Thursday.

Meanwhile, the world champion D Gukesh has also ended his winless run to finally register his first victory of the tournament in the eighth round against Levon Aronian of the USA.

Both Gukesh and Pragg had black pieces in eighth round, but they overcame this challenge to claim victories, and now Pragg with 5/8 points is on the top of the leaderboard while Gukesh is in joint seventh place with 3.5/8 points.

Pragg was in complete control throughout the match as he showed a brilliant accuracy rate of 98% against Wesley, who resigned from the match in a mate in 9 position after just 38 moves.

With only one round to go, the tournament is finely poised, with Praggnanandhaa going into the final round with a half a point lead over the chasing pack of three players, Fabiano, Alireza, and Maxime.

In the final round, Praggnanandhaa will take on Levon Aronian of the USA, and a win in the match will confirm his victory in the tournament, whereas Gukesh will be hoping to end the tournament on a high against Fabiano Caruana of the USA.

Round 8 results:

Fabine Caruana (USA) Drew With Maximum ator-Lagrave (fragan)

Jan Krzysztof Duda (Pol) Drew with deac Bogdan Daniel (Rou)

ALIREZA ViceUz (FRA) Drew WITH Nodirbek Abdusattorov (UZB)

Wesley So (USA) lost to R. Praggnanandhaa (IND)

Levon Aronian (ind) Lost to d Gukesh (ind)