Chess

GCL is the world's first and largest official franchise league of its kind, with chess players competing in a unique joint team format. GCL will feature male and female chess champions competing on the same team. The league's joint male-female teams will have the rare distinction of being the only joint team in a professional sports league.

After the stunning win over the Norwegian Wizard, the 28-year-old chess grandmaster Gujrathi joined the likes of fellow Indian GMs R Praggnanandhaa, D Gukesh and Arjun Erigaisi in beating Carlsen. Vidit is leading the Indian Yogis team in PCL that fielded Vidit, Vaishali, Raunak and Aronyak against Magnus, Aryan Tari, Razvan Preotu, and Jennifer Yu.

Young Indian players had scalped several top ranking players of the world. For instance, young Grandmaster (GM) R. Praggnanandhaa had defeated World Champion Magnus Carlsen. The year 2022 also saw Praggnanandhaa and International Master Bhakti Kulkarni being awarded the prestigious Arjuna Award.

Another Asian level chess tournament will also be held in India next year, AICF President, Dr Sanjay Kapoor told IANS."We are going to organise the FIDE Women Grand Prix in March 2023 and an Asian calendar event later in 2023," he said.The event is expected to be held in Delhi.This will be the second major international event being held in India after the Chess Olympiad that was held in Chennai this year.

Players across seven countries have participated in this Junior Rapid Chess Championship conducted by Red Knight Chess club, in the under-8 category. Aryaveer secured the silver medal with a creditable score of four points out of a possible six. while Suthiponpaisarn Proudpitcha of Thailand secured gold with a score of 5/6, a release from the South Mumbai Chess Academy (SMCA) said.

The 8-year-old Avyaay Garg (ELO rating 1242), a third-standard student of Aditya Birla World Academy, claimed the silver medal in his age group's open U-8 category that concluded on Thursday in the Senja Cashew Community Centre in Singapore. About 500 participants were in the fray from across 10 countries in the four-day tourney. Avyaay grabbed the second position with an incredible score of 7 points out of a possible 8 while Singapore's Lim Shi Hun Magnus secured the top position with 7.5 points.

China too advanced to the final of the tournament being played in Jerusalem. In the double-header semifinal, China drew 2-2 with Spain, then won the second match 3-1, thanks to wins from Lu Shanglei and Bai Jinshi over Jaime Santos Latasa and Alexei Shirov respectively.

India and France beat each other 3-1 to force a tiebreak blitz match, which was won by the Indian team 2.5-1.5. In Wednesday's doubleheader quarterfinals, China beat Poland 2.5-1.5, including wins by Lu Shanglei and Bai Jinshi over Radoslaw Wojtaszek and Mateusz Bartel respectively, in the first match before tying the Polish men 2-2 in the second for a berth in the top four.

The five national teams joined China, Ukraine and Uzbekistan, who had already secured their places in the last eight on Monday. Spain beat South Africa 4-0 in the fifth and last round of the six-team Group A, while China drew 2-2 with France. Ukraine and the Netherlands also drew 2-2. China finished first in the group with nine points, ahead of France, Spain, and Ukraine, who gained six points each, reports Xinhua.

The World champion blew away 17-year-old sensation Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa of India to seal the final event of the season held at the SHACK15 venue in San Francisco on Saturday. Going into Sunday's Round 6 matches, only Poland's World Cup winner Jan-Krzysztof Duda stood any real chance of overtaking Carlsen on the tournament leaderboard. But having lost on Saturday to surrender the lead to Carlsen, despite the champ dropping a point himself, Duda lost again to US star Wesley So.