2006 Tournaments

[Kumar]

Chess Olympiad here we come (oct 15th). Strongest Men and Women team ever fielded by India!!! Can Indians Win a medal?

Olympic coaching camp has begun, see the article in Hindu,
http://www.hindu.com/2004/09/17/stories ... 451800.htm

Mens Team - Anand, K. Sasikiran, P. Harikrishna, Ganguly, Abhijit Kunte and Sandipan Chanda.

Women's Team - Koneru Humpy, Viji, Dronavalli Harika and Nisha Mohota

What do you think are India's chances?

[suresh]

Sasikiran seemed to be woefully out of form in the Cat. 16 tournament held in India.
But I think he will be ready for the Olympiad. Rather than give my opinion, I will
give you Anand's take on it -- first, Russia is the favourite to win the Olympiad.
India's performance will depend on how they do in the beginning stages.
I think we should look for top 10 finishes in both men and women and maybe a few
medals(?) for individual performances. With Koneru Humpy playing the top table,
Viji should have a good chance to collect points.

[Kumar]

Suresh, top 10 finish is the minimu m finish Indians should expect to do better and win the medal. form of Sasi is a little concern. Letz hope he can bounce back

[BSharma]

I have not followed the Indian chess scene closely but based on Anand's assessment I am voting for the Indian women to bring home a medal.

[david]

Anand will be here in Bangalore on Monday (tomorrow).

Does any one wants to ask any questions to Anand.
(please post them here)

[BSharma]

I get a chance to ask questions from the best chess player in the world and I am speechless!

Give my best wishes to Anand and the Indian team.

Thanks David.

[suresh]

My question for Anand:

Can you give us an objective assessment of where Indian chess (both Indian men
and women) stands today and where it should be in five years from now?

[Kumar]

NOt sure if my question are in time..

1) Would he continue to play in future olympiads or would it depend on if India has a strong team?

2) Who among the indians could be dark horse and really come up big?

[Indian]

Don't think India has a medal chance in Women as only Koneru is good at the moment. Viji is not the same player she once was and declining. Though, I still expect them in top 10 with some old magic from Viji and few upsets from other players. Koneru has to perform well and she should as she will be one of the top seeds.

In men, very unpredictable for us. Anand is back and should get us few easy points on board 1. But, we need Sasi and Hari to play well on Board 2 and 3 to get some points. Russia will be the favorite.

Anyway, anybody thinking about going to Calvia for the tournament. It's a nice tourist place!

[david]

Sorry Sureshji and Kumarji,

I left Bangalore on an emergency (my aunt was hospitalised in Hyd) and did not meet Anand this time.

However, I will post the answers soon as I hope to get a reply from Anand.

[Kumar]

Sorry Sureshji and Kumarji,

I take exception to your statmnt, Davidji .. YOu make me sound very old with 'ji' , while I am barely into my 20s (just 29)...

HOpe your Aunt is doing well now


Indian welcome to the forum.. I was also wondering about Viji's form.. David / Indian, any ideas what happened to the once most dominant female in Indian sports

[PKBasu]

Perhaps we shouldn't hold these polls before sporting events, because we are liable to be disappointed and the recriminations afterwards are always rather heated!
Anyway, I voted for both (playing the role of "eternal optimist about India" that some in the forum have chosen to label me). But there is some basis for optimism here, since we have the 2nd-ranked men's chess player (Anand) and the 5th-ranked women's chess player (Humpy). In Sasikiran we have another world-class player, and Harikrishna is among the world's best juniors -- apart from other good players such as Ganguly and Kunte. So we are competitive, but will need a bit of luck to come back with a medal. On the women's side I only really know about Humpy, but she may well be the highest-ranked player in the Olympiad (as she was in the world championship that she failed to win in the absence of Judith Polgar and the #2 Xie Jun).

[PKBasu]

In the rating of countries by FIDE (which takes the average ELO rating of the top 10 players in each country), India is a rather lowly 14th ! Of course you need your top 3 on the men's and women's side to perform at the Olympiad, but clearly we lack depth -- reflecting the continued star system in Indian sports, marked by one big star and a big gap with the next string of players. Not just in chess, but we need to develop greater depth of talent in virtually every sport.

[Kumar]

Chess Olympiad just 4 days away and not much news in the indian media.. With Second cricket match starting at chennai, the awesome indian performance in chess is goingto be utterly overshadowed by atrocious indian cricket team with lot of authors fighting to write the postmortem...


http://www.35chessolympiad.com/

[BSharma]

It is bad timing for Indian chess and the cricket crazy nation will ignore the performance of the Indian chess team unless a medal or two are won by the players.