Slouching tiger, hidden dragon?

Once fearsome, world chess champion Ding Liren has struggled with mental health setbacks but underestimate him at your peril

- Susan Ninan

Saint Louis 2019. Ding Liren did something that no one had done in a while - defeat Magnus Carlsen in the tie-break playoff of a major tournament. A first since 2007. In a sit-down interview with HT last week, Carlsen used a verb he sparingly does for any fellow chess player. "Ding is someone I massively respected... even feared," Carlsen said.

The "feared" Ding hasn't been seen in a while. The 32-year-old Chinese GM will face 18-year-old Gukesh in the World Championship match, starting on Monday. His crown is on the line the one piece of carry-on Gukesh wants to take back to India from Singapore. As for Ding, almost never has a defending world champion appeared this vulnerable heading into a title match. Who's to say though which version of him will show up or if he even wants the title enough a second time around?

Gukesh and his team have in the run-up to this match often spoken of preparing for "Ding at his best". The pre-pandemic Ding - extremely well-rounded, creative, accurate, a player with no real weaknesses so to speak and who may have perhaps troubled Carlsen had he made the 2021 title match-appears to have vanished. In the period between August 2017 and November 2018, he had a remarkable 100-game unbeaten streak in classical chess. Had things been different and life not thrown him a curve-ball, Ding at his peak may have been a pretty scary guy to go up against in a match.