Errol Tiwari

Grandmaster and the tenth world chess champion (1969-1972 ) Boris Spassky of Russia died two Thursdays ago.

Many of the chess games which I have replayed were decided in the middle game; either from material advantages, passed pawns, successful combinations or unimaginative blunders.

In any chess game there is an opening, a middle game and an ending.

There is this unending discussion in chess about whether the players of yesteryear could have matched the champions of today.

Prize funds in chess seem to have settled at US$1 million or US$2 million for a world championship match, US$500,000 for a Candidates tournament, US$300,000 for the Sinquefield Cup, the Magnus Tour majors, or the World Cup, in recent times.

There has been speculation about the lifetime earnings of elite chess players since last week’s article on the top earners of 2024.

Last week I wrote on the importance of owning a chess set for various reasons.

A cardinal principle of chess is that an active player should own, and treasure his or her individual chess set and chess clock.

In 1997, in New York, humans suffered an enormous blow to their chess ego when Deep Blue, a chess computer, outplayed Garry Kaspa-rov, a reigning world champion.

In mid-October last year, an elite chess player was expelled from a team championship in Spain after being accused of cheating by using a cell phone during bathroom breaks between moves.

The world witnessed the regrettable blunder the champion made during the final endgame of the 2024 World Championship Chess Match.

Guyana’s big moment in chess for 2024 was the Olympiad in Hungary.

Gukesh Dommaraju, 18, of India, captured the undisputed World Championship Chess Crown by beating Chinese world champion Ding Liren two Thursdays ago 7.5 to 6.5 in Singapore as was reported in the Chess Column last Sunday.

The world has a new chess champion. Grandmaster Gukesh Dommaraju, 18, on Thursday became the youngest person to attain this goal when he won the last game of the 14-game match, taking the title for India.

At the conclusion of round nine of the 2024 FIDE World Chess Championship on Thursday, the players were tied at 4.5-4 .5 in the 14-game encounter.  The first player to reach the 7.5 points mark wins the contest.

Scores were tied after the first three games of the FIDE 2024 World Championship Tournament between challenger Gukesh Dommaraju, 18, a rising chess star from India and champion Ding Liren of China.

The FIDE World Chess Championship begins tomorrow in Singapore and features 14 classical games plus a rapid and blitz section if they become necessary.

At 18 years old, Gukesh Dommaraju often referred to as Gukesh D of India, is the youngest person in the history of chess to have ever qualified to become a contender for the title of World Champion.

Chinese grandmaster and world chess champion Ding Liren, 32, will defend his title against India’s Dommaraju Gukesh, 18, in a 14-game classical match starting November 25 in Singapore.

Although there are a substantial number of chess tournaments happening around the globe this November, the 2024 FIDE World Championship Match commencing November 25 takes precedence.