India and Russia co-champions of FIDE (Chess) Online Olympiad

[Gollum]

Because of Corona we are having an online edition of the Olympiad this year, rapid format and 6 boards: 2 men, 2 women, 2 juniors (boy, girl)...Anand, Vidit, Humpy, Harika, Praggu, Nihal.....the 2 junior girls are Divya Deshmukh and Vantika Agrawal. Our juniors are much younger (4-5 years) than counterparts from other countries, so even better news for future of Indian chess. 

 

Didn't follow this event but good to see us in the final. Final 2 out of 163 participating nations, not bad. We were 7th seed (avg rating) going to this tournament.

 

In the pool stage we topped the group beating all opponents including tough teams like China , Germany, Georgia, Iran, Vietnam....

 

 

Then we beat Armenia in QF, Poland in SF today....at least not chokers like the cricket team. Final will be against top seed Russia or the US team (more like UN since they import players like Poms)

Jai Hind

Edited August 30, 2020 by Gollum

[Gollum]

If 19 year olds from other countries are unable to match our 13-14 year olds (not just this competition) shows how far we have come. In the 70s 14 year old kids from USSR/Europe/USA would probably toy with our national champs. 

 

Pity that top level chess is so difficult to follow/understand, but as long as the Tiranga flies high no complaints. 

Edited August 29, 2020 by Gollum

[Gollum]

Pakistan's avg rating this tourney is 1410 LINK Wtf do they even do in that country? All talk. 

 

ICF team of 6 will smoke that team with time odds. So weak our padosis are. 

[Gollum]

So this is the squad...Harikrishna, Chidambaram, Vaishali, Kulkarni in addition to the names in OP. Guess they played more in the pool stage and we are playing our best lineup in KOs. 

 

Hope final is against Russia, win or lose we must measure ourselves against the GOAT chess nation. One day we will take that mantle from them, has to start somewhere. 

Edited August 29, 2020 by Gollum

[Vickydev]

39 minutes ago, Gollum said:

If 19 year olds from other countries are unable to match our 13-14 year olds (not just this competition) shows how far we have come. In the 70s 14 year old kids from USSR/Europe/USA would probably toy with our national champs. 

 

Pity that top level chess is so difficult to follow/understand, but as long as the Tiranga flies high no complaints. 

How good are Pragnnananda and Nihal in your opinion? I follow chess games here and there. They are supposed to be our brightest talents right?

[Gollum]

4 minutes ago, Vickydev said:

How good are Pragnnananda and Nihal in your opinion? I follow chess games here and there. They are supposed to be our brightest talents right?

Difficult to predict future since stagnation is quite common with most chess prodigies. But I will be surprised if they don't make it to top 10 in (max) 5 years time. When guys like Kasparov, Kramnik, Anand, Carlsen, Aronian see something in them who are we to question their judgement? In fact back in 2013 Carlsen much to everyone's surprise identified India as future chess superpower ahead of China, that time Chinese were producing many amazing young talents. Kramnik, Gelfand among other strong GMs/trainers are running camps for Indian youngsters, there is no $$$ problem, so future is bright. 

 

Purely talking about classical chess strength today, Nihal is the strongest U-16 player in the world, Prag strongest U-15, both among top 5-6 U-19 players with scalps of some elite GMs. That's how good they are, not as good as 15/16 yo Carlsen but both damn good. Both would be top board in some European countries at this tender age. 

[randomGuy]

We came from behind today... armageddon is so stressful. For some reason, Harikrishna playing polish league in place of Olympiad?? He is stronger than Anand on current form.

[Gollum]

Just now, randomGuy said:

We came from behind today... armageddon is so stressful. For some reason, Harikrishna playing polish league in place of Olympiad?? He is stronger than Anand on current form.

Not as per FIDE rankings which is a pretty good indicator, RANKING

Plus he is weaker in rapid/blitz, in rapid stronger than Vidit but weaker than Anand. 

[randomGuy]

1 hour ago, Gollum said:

If 19 year olds from other countries are unable to match our 13-14 year olds (not just this competition) shows how far we have come. In the 70s 14 year old kids from USSR/Europe/USA would probably toy with our national champs. 

 

Pity that top level chess is so difficult to follow/understand, but as long as the Tiranga flies high no complaints. 

I know right...square and their notations difficult to memorize...I know for ex. White King's  pawn goes to e4, Indian defence bishops in g2 or b2, best squares for knight f3 c3 etc. n likewise for black... but difficult to visualise entire board in the head in one go..n so fast move order

[Gollum]

I think it is possible to play both, a couple of 15 minute games in afternoon IST since matches in Europe take place after 19:30 IST.

[randomGuy]

4 minutes ago, Gollum said:

Not as per FIDE rankings which is a pretty good indicator, RANKING

Plus he is weaker in rapid/blitz, in rapid stronger than Vidit but weaker than Anand. 

Vidit will wipe the floor with anand these days...the way he played in chess masters n Olympiad ... clearly past his prime

[Gollum]

2 minutes ago, randomGuy said:

I know right...square and their notations difficult to memorize...I know for ex. White King's  pawn goes to e4, Indian defence bishops in g2 or b2, best squares for knight f3 c3 etc. n likewise for black... but difficult to visualise entire board in the head in one go..n so fast move order

Apart from notation I don't understand their moves, can't see tactics like them, I don't have opening knowledge or endgame technique. Take away the engine eval and I think most fans will find it very difficult to evaluate positions, never mind predicting moves. Such a beautiful game but more enjoyable when we play it rather than being spectator. Opposite of most other sports/games where it is more fun to follow rather than play. 

[Gollum]

2 minutes ago, randomGuy said:

Vidit will wipe the floor with anand these days...the way he played in chess masters n Olympiad ... clearly past his prime

Sure way past his prime. But 1-2 tourneys don't mean much esp online games. If Vidit is that much better it should show in the rankings. Unlike in other sports, chess ratings do not lie, very accurate and you get what you deserve. In the FIDE Nations Cup Anand played well while Vidit lost most of his games. Vidit is the captain here, if he thinks he can wipe the floor with Anand he should play top board where he will be up against best players from other countries. 

[randomGuy]

4 minutes ago, Gollum said:

Sure way past his prime. But 1-2 tourneys don't mean much esp online games. If Vidit is that much better it should show in the rankings. Unlike in other sports, chess ratings do not lie, very accurate and you get what you deserve. In the FIDE Nations Cup Anand played well while Vidit lost most of his games. Vidit is the captain here, if he thinks he can wipe the floor with Anand he should play top board where he will be up against best players from other countries. 

Sometimes ratings lie... anand maybe 50 odd points less than his best ever rating but playing significantly worse.

[randomGuy]

Chess.com rating highly reputable...duda from Poland rated 2900 iirc Vishy rated 2400

[Gollum]

In 2016 or '17 not sure, Harikrishna was India's highest rated player for a couple of months. Only time Anand wasn't India's #1 in the last 35 odd years. Vidit's peak rating (2726) is lower than Anand's lowest rating since early 90s which was still above 2750. Meaning Vidit's best is lower than Anand's worst by 25 points, long way to go for him before throwing statements like 'wipe the floor'. In rapid/blitz Hari and Vidit have never gone past Anand's rating, too big a gap there. In fact Vidit is 2636 in rapid (#109), Hari is 2614 in blitz (#121). 

 

 

[Gollum]

21 minutes ago, randomGuy said:

Chess.com rating highly reputable...duda from Poland rated 2900 iirc Vishy rated 2400

Only reputable rating is FIDE rating followed by USCF. Even an IM is 2400+ and 2900 shouldn't lose to 2400 like it happened today in their 2nd game. 

 

Firstly Anand's sample size is low, 10-15 games is nothing and one of the losses clearly is cos he lost net connection, only played 2 blitz games. https://www.chess.com/member/thevish

He doesn't play online much on this platform, he had another account where he played just 12 games and was 2794 https://www.chess.com/member/mumbaimover64

I think he played on ICC before.

 

Duda must have played thousands of games incl against weak players and once you play that many it doesn't fluctuate much. Sample size is imp.

 

Moreover don't take chess.com ratings seriously, if you play an OTB tourney they won't bother with online rating. Also online ratings are inflated.

Edited August 29, 2020 by Gollum

[randomGuy]

17 minutes ago, Gollum said:

In 2016 or '17 not sure, Harikrishna was India's highest rated player for a couple of months. Only time Anand wasn't India's #1 in the last 35 odd years. Vidit's peak rating (2726) is lower than Anand's lowest rating since early 90s which was still above 2750. Meaning Vidit's best is lower than Anand's worst by 25 points, long way to go for him before throwing statements like 'wipe the floor'. In rapid/blitz Hari and Vidit have never gone past Anand's rating, too big a gap there. In fact Vidit is 2636 in rapid (#109), Hari is 2614 in blitz (#121). 

 

 

Anands game may be deteriorating fast with age, when was the last he played a rated game?..he is already oldest player (with gelfand, who also isn't special now)...

 

Then there is another question on OTB (over the board) vs online...from all evidence (online ratings n recent games) Vishy is significantly weaker.5 time world champion much respect for that... plus the longevity...but past his prime...weaker than younger team-mates now

 

 

[Gollum]

2 minutes ago, randomGuy said:

Anands game may be deteriorating fast with age, when was the last he played a rated game?..he is already oldest player (with gelfand, who also isn't special now)...

Obviously weaker (6 years older than Kramnik, Topalov!!!!) and will only get worse as he ages, in fact I want him to retire but maybe like Karpov he just enjoys playing without worrying about results.

 

Vidit, Harikrishna have to step up, this is an individual sport so they have all opportunities to win some events and make their name. Otherwise we will have to wait for Nihal or some other youngster to take over from Vishy bypassing a couple of generations. 

[Gollum]

Diff between boards 1 and 2 will be around 50 points, more if it is Duda and Gajewski. Tougher to play top board, Vishy came back well to beat Duda with black after the first game loss. But if Vidit feels he is in better nick he should play top board against USA or Russia, captain decides that and Anand is generally quite chilled out, so all up to Vidit now. I will be happy with draw on men's side, juniors and Humpy/Harika hold the key IMO. 

 

No expectations, we are underdogs and have already surpassed pre-tournament seeding, Russia and UN are the top two seeds, if we lose it is expected...if we win, great. Proud of Team India irrespective of final result. 

Edited August 29, 2020 by Gollum