Thursday Coffee
Thursday Coffee
How are you today? There is a lot going on in the chess world right now, besides the Dubai match for the World Championship between Magnus Carlsen and challenger Ian Nepomniachtchi.
A number of strong national championships are taking place: Israel, Argentina, Italy, Croatia and Serbia come readily to mind. There might be others also! With the pandemic and backlog confusion of tournaments resulting that federations have to organize before the end of the year, chess activity right now is very high.
Carlsen match expectations fizzle out
This match will be remembered for the complete and sudden collapse of Russian challenger Ian Nepomniachtchi starting with the 6th game. Ian lost a dead drawn ending in game #6 and this probably affected his confidence.
The result was that his play became marked by uncertainties and little mistakes. Carlsen pounced on them mercilessly and now the match is just a formality as Carlsen approaches the necessary 7.5 points to maintain his World title.
Vesma Baltgailis RIP
Sad news from Collingwood, Ontario that Vesma Baltgailis died suddenly last Friday (3rd of December) at age 71. Born on March 23, 1950, Vesma made a name for herself in the late 70s and 80s as one of Canada’s top female players.
Vesma participated in 9 Canadian Championships and represented Canada at the Chess Olympiad not less than 6 times. My most sincere condolences to her brother Bo, and to her niece Jessica and nephew Zakk. Canadian chess is a poorer place today.
FIDE criticized for sportswashing
ChessTech writes : ”The Norwegian Helsinki Committee, a human rights organisation, accuses FIDE of awarding its major events to authoritarian regimes like the United Arab Emirates, Russia, China and Kazakhstan for sportswashing, directing attention away from poor human rights records and corruption, in an article of the newspaper Aftenposten.”
”The World Chess Championship takes place in “one of the world’s most oppressed countries”. Why does the World Chess Championship take place in a country where critics are gagged and imprisoned? Those responsible (FIDE) refuse to answer.” –Aftenposten
It is not just FIDE president Dvorkovich who is responsible for FIDE’s poor human rights record and for constant violation its anti-discrimination rules by awarding important FIDE championships to such countries. It started long before!
I have written extensively on this question, and while I admit that the issues involved are complex and nuanced, FIDE’s behavior has always been ”Give me money and I will look the other way!”