The
2022 Chess Olympiad will kick-start on 28th July 2022 (today) in the
Chennai-Mahabalipuram with a never seen before opening ceremony. 2000 players
& teams from more than 180 countries from across the globe have already
reached the venue when i am typing this content. Almost all the players have
already registered their happiness on the arrangements made for the tournament
including pick-up from the airports. Sincere thanks to the state & central
government of India for the same.
Over the
board (OTB) Chess Olympiad happened last time in 2018. The Chess Olympiad is
conducted once every 2 years. Due to Covid-19 pandemic, FIDE held an Online Chess Olympiad in 2020 and 2021, with a rapid time control that affected players’ online
ratings. For 2022 Chess Olympiad, India
will be seen hosting it for the first time in the history. The All
India Chess Federation (AICF) along with FIDE also hosted a torch relay across
the country for the first time in history.
India will
be seen fielding a total of 6 teams at the 2022 Chess Olympiad, while the
maximum limit for countries are two teams - 1 team in the open and 1 team in
the women's category. Why? As-per the rules of FIDE, the host nation for the
Chess Olympiad can field two teams in each in both open and women's section,
i.e, 2 teams in the open and 2 teams in the women’s category. With the Olympiad
being hosted in Chennai, India is entitled to have 4 teams in the event.
But, where
does the fifth & sixth team come into the picture?
Since the
total number of teams registered to compete in the both open and women's
section were odd, FIDE awarded the hosts India with one more slot in each
category to even things out. Thus, India is allowed to field 6 teams in the
2022 Chess Olympiad, i.e, 3 teams in the open & 3 teams in the women’s
category
This is how
the 6 Indian teams will line up for the Olympiad.
Open
Section
Team A: Vidit Gujrathi, Pentala Harikrishna, Arjun Erigiasi, SL Narayanan, Kiran Sasikiran
Team
B: B Adhiban, R Praggnanandhha, Nihal Sarin, D Gukesh, Raunak Sadhwani
Team
C: Surya Sekhar Ganguly, Karthikeyan Murali, SP Sethuraman, Abhijeet
Gupta, Abhimanyu Puranik
Women's
Section
Team
A: Koneru Humpy, Harika Dronavalli, R Vaishali, Tania Sachdev,
Bhakti Kulkarni
Team
B: Vantika Agarwal, Sowmya Swaminathan, Mary Ann Gomes, Padmini Rout,
Divya Deshmukh