Four rounds have been already played at the European Team Chess Championship 2025, and only a few teams kept the perfect score of 8 match points.

Defending Champions, Serbia, scored the fourth consecutive win in the tournament to emerge as the sole leader of the European Team Chess Championship 2025. Serbian team narrowly defeated Greece, with the final score of 2.5-1.5. The first game to finish was played on the first board, where GM Alexandr Predke (SRB, 2634) shockingly lost a decisively better position to GM Nikolas Theodorou (GRE, 2652). Predke blundered a tactical motive which was spotted by Theodoru and Greece took the lead. GM Alexey Sarana (SRB, 2661) drew against GM Stamatis Kourkoulos-Arditis (GRE, 2583) after a solid game, and the heroes of the Serbian team were GM Aleksandar Indjic (SRB, 2618) and GM Velimir Ivic (SRB, 2628) who scored victories against GM Ioannis Papaioannou (GRE, 2623) and GM Antonios Pavlidis (GRE, 2579).

The team of Ukraine was victorious against the top-seeded Germany, and now trails the leading Serbia by one match point. The only decisive game in the match between Ukraine and Germany happened on the second board, where GM Andrei Volokitin (UKR, 2617) outplayed GM Matthias Bluebaum (GER, 2687) in the 25-move miniature. The other three games finished in draws, and the final result of the match was 2.5-1.5 in favour of Ukraine.

As many as seven teams score 6 match points each, tying for current third place: Greece, Netherlands, Azerbaijan, France, Spain, England, and Slovenia.

Two teams in the Women’s section remained with the maximum score of 8 match points: Poland and Germany.

Poland was victorious against the defending European Women’s Team Chess Champions – Bulgaria, after a tense and narrow match which finished with the score of 2.5-1.5. Playing on the top board IM Alina Kashlinskaya (POL, 2450) outplayed GM Antoaneta Stefanova (BUL, 2393) with White pieces and scored a win. IM Oliwia Kiolbasa (POL, 2388) scored the second point for Poland after defeating WGM Beloslava Krasteva (BUL, 2316) in the game fulfilled with turnovers. Kiolbasa first gained a clear advantage in the opening, but then made a mistake, and Krasteva overtook the advantage. Both players were facing time trouble, but Krasteva blundered a tactical motive and there was no coming back. She was forced to resign in the 31st move. WGM Nadya Toncheva (BUL, 2332) scored on the fourth board against IM Klaudia Kulon (POL, 2336), and the game between IM Aleksandra Maltsevskaya (POL, 2394) and IM Nurgyul Salimova (BUL, 2385) finished in draw after moves repetition, despite Maltsevskaya’s decisive advantage in the final moments.

Germany scored a narrow 2.5-1.5 win over higher-rated Azerbaijan. WGM Kateryna Dolzhykova (GER, 2300) defeated IM Gulnar Mammadova (AZE, 2323) after highly tensed fight. Getting out of the opening, Mammadova had a clear advantage with Whites, but then started to make mistakes in the early endgame. WGM Kateryna Dolzhykova was gradually improving her position, until finally reaching the winning rooks endgame with two pawns up. It was shocking to see her making a big blunder which dropped the evaluation bar to 00.00, but Mammadova didn’t manage to hold it and lost anyway. Playing on the second board, IM Khanim Balajayeva (AZE, 2351) was outplaying WGM Hanna Marie Klek (GER, 2328) but missed the winning motive and the German representative escaped with the perpetual check. Games on the first and third board between IM Dinara Wagner (GER, 2410) and IM Ulviyya Fataliyeva (AZE, 2410), and between FM Schulze Lara (GER, 2319) and WGM Govhar Beydullayeva (AZE, 2362) finished in solid draws.

Germany and Poland are now two match points ahead of the runner-ups: Georgia 1, Bulgaria, France and Ukraine who score 6 match points each.

All results, rankings and pairings can be found here.

Live broadcast of the games can be followed through the ECU TV platform or the ECU YouTube channel with commentaries by GM Alojzije Jankovic and WGM Keti Tsatsalashvili.

Photo gallery (photos by ECU) can be found here