Nineteen-year-old Sasha Shariff, a University of Guyana student is considered the favourite in the annual Women’s National Chess Championship which began on Thursday at the School of the Nations, Georgetown and ends on August 20. Shariff has already won the seven-round National Qualifiers Tournament with 6½ points. (A win = 1 point, a draw = ½ and a loss = 0.)
Meanwhile, Pooja Lam, 14, the West Coast Demerara schoolgirl who won last year’s Women’s National, is not participating in this year’s contest as she is concentrating on her academic studies.
The ten players contesting the 2023 Women’s Champion-ship are primarily teenagers. While youths are realising there is an attractiveness to chess, in Guyana, it is becoming clear that young girls are rivalling boys for chess attention. Recently, Secretary of the Guyana Chess Federation Marcia Lee established a Women in Chess Committee, which angles women toward chess.