The rout is on. Anna Ushenina was lost with White after just 18 moves and resigned after 24 moves with just about all of her pieces en prise. Ushenina may have a good tactical eye, but she was outcalculated and outclassed by Hou Yifan in the complications today. Hou leads their best-of-ten world championship match 2.5-.5, and is looking like a big favorite to regain her title.
I'm hoping for a massacre, in part because I'm rooting for Hou, in part because I'm rooting against Ushenina (due to her unfortunate habit of staring at her opponents*) but also in the hope that FIDE will eliminate forever these big knockout events as a way to determine the world champion. As a way of determining some candidates in a two-year cycle it's not bad, as it gives more players a chance to compete without knocking out the really elite players who have proved day in and day out that they are at the top. Put in "philosophical" form, lesser candidates merit lesser, more random opportunities while stronger candidates merit some insulation from chance. To the extent that this is a blowout, that will lessen the value of Ushenina's knockout title and the credibility of that format.
That said, Ushenina's achievement in winning that event was a great one, and it isn't her fault that FIDE chose that format. It's just a bad format, and it would have been a poor format even if Hou had managed to win there. (Incidentally, Hou was in a truly bizarre position. She was the defending world champion, and had won the Grand Prix cycle, which meant that she had already qualified for the current title match no matter what. Had she won the knockout too the absurd situation would have arisen that she as champion would have again won the title and the qualifier, but would still have to defend against someone she had bested in the qualifier. What a painfully stupid way of doing things!)
* I acknowledge that psychology plays a role in chess, and wouldn't try to legislate against it even if I could. But doing things to distract one's opponent - other than making good moves, of course - crosses a line into bad sportsmanship, and staring serves no other function than to distract.