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Chess
Finds A Place In Asian Games
Humpy Loses But Leads!
By Arvind Aaron
December 2006 is a big leap forward in history for chess. Chess became a
part of an official games of a
continent for the first time. After failures in the past including having
chess as a side show in the Sydney 2000 games, and trying to please the
IOC after Kirsan Ilyumzhinov became FIDE President this is the big moment
for the historic game invented in India. To witness and
cherish this moment in reality at Doha in the Asian Games are FIDE
President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov and Florencio Campomanes.
So, how is chess played? There are three titles for chess, three gold,
three silver and three bronze medals counting. The first part is a rapid
chess event for men and women in 3 days played over a nine round Swiss for
41 players in men and 21 players in women. Next is a combined team
event where each nation will have two men and one women in the team. It
will be a three board match with two men and one women in the team. This
team event will be classical chess.
The first six rounds has seen Koneru Humpy running away with a lead in
women and the contest is more
close in men with top three seeds failing to impress so far. Humpy was off
the block with a 5/5 score to lead. A shocking defeat to Zhao Xue of China
has jolted the Vijayawada girl but she is still in lead with 5/6.
Zhao Xue is no push over. She was the player of the Bled Olympiad 2002 and
is also very young. In the second place on 4.5 points are Zhao
Xue (China), Atousha Pourkashiyan (Iran), Irine Kharisma Sukandar
(Indonesia). Humpy has defeated most of the rivals including Zhu Chen (now
Qatar). Three rounds remain to be played.
After six rounds, Murtas Kazhgaleyev (Kaz), Xiangzhi Bu (Chn) and Dao
Thien Hai (Vie) are in the lead with five points. Second seed Pentala
Harikrishna suffered his first defeat to Wang Yue of China and is on
3.5/6. Second seed Krishnan Sasikiran only drew IM Al Sayed of Qatar
with white to move to 3.5/6.
Third seed and former FIDE champion Rustam Kasimdzhanov of Uzbekistan is
on 3.5 points too after beating GM Reefat Bin-Sattar (Ban). The top three
seeds are struggling with only three rounds still to be played.
Games are not available but those requiring a quick look at the results
can go to www.doha-2006.com and select chess and see the results. The
games are played at 11 a.m., 3 p.m. and 5 p.m. India is one and a half
hours ahead of Qatar in time zone.
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Published on : 04.12.2006
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