On 9th August, the curtains were drawn on the 44th Chess Olympiad at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in Chennai in a grand ceremony attended by dignitaries including FIDE President Arkady Dvorkovich, Deputy Chairman & GM Viswanathan Anand, & Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K Stalin.
The Chief Minister honoured the open section winners, the open sector winner's trophy was delivered to GM Ivan Sokolov, the coach & captain of the youthful Uzbekistan squad, by FIDE President Arkady Dvorkovich.
In a ceremony that lasted four hours and was packed with excitement, FIDE head Arkady Dvorkovich handed over the Olympic flag to Laszlo Szabo, Chairman of the Hungarian Chess Federation; Budapest will be the site of the 45th Chess Olympiad.
Back to the Roots with the Flaming Torch
The Chess Olympiad 2022 Finals
The teams were segregated into five categories based on strength and the medals awarded as per the scores. This helped most countries to assess their team’s strengths and progress.
For the winners, Uzbekistan took home the Open title, while Ukraine triumphed in the women's competition after a nail-biting finale.
Uzbekistan bagged the gold for Category A becoming the overall winner in the Open. The rest of the categories B, C, D & E, were won by Moldova, Tunisia, Libya and Maldives respectively.
While Ukraine (overall winner) won the gold in the women’s section for Category A, the rest were won by Lithuania, Albania, Kenya and Eswatini.
At the end of the 10th & final round at the 44th FIDE Chess Olympiad, the 12th-seeded Armenia upset the 6th-seeded Azerbaijan 3-1 to achieve 17 match points and become joint leaders. It took a dramatic fifth hour for the 14th-seeded Uzbekistan to earn a 2-2 draw against the 11th-seeded India and join the lead, alongside Armenia.
Both Uzbekistan and Armenia won their final matches, with Uzbekistan edging the Netherlands 2.5-1.5 & Armenia beating Spain 1-0 to tie for first place with 19 points. Using a series of tiebreakers, Uzbekistan was declared the victor, with Armenia taking second place. With 18 match points, India secured bronze.
The best players on each board at the Chess Olympiad 2022 were awarded medals and awards in addition to the team winners. The Swedish GM Pia Cramling, with 9.5/11 points as well as a 2532 rating performance, topped as Board 1 player in the Women's section. Grandmaster Nino Batsiashvili dominated the second board, scoring 7.5/10 as well as a performance of 2504.
For her performance on the third board, WIM Oliwia Kiolbasa took home the gold medal, scoring 9.5/11 and achieving a mark of 2565. Fourth-board performer WCM Bat-Erdene Mungunzul scored 2460 and earned 8.5/11 points, making him the best player in the game. In the 5th board reserve section, WGM Jana Schneider had the best individual performance, scoring 2414 on a possible 9.
With a score of 9-1-1 and then a performance rating of 2867 in the Open division, GM Gukesh D was declared the best individual player on Board 1. Board 2's top performer, GM Nihal Sarin, had a performance of 2774 on 7.5/10. GM David Howell, who achieved a score of 7.5/8 and a performance of 2898 was awarded gold as the best team player on the third board.
Hero of the Uzbek Team, GM Jakhongir Vakhidov, scored 6.5/8 on Board 4 and a performance of 2813. For the Open section, GM Mateusz Bartel's score of 8.5/10 and performance of 2778 rated him as the top reserve (5th board player).
The Indian Team: The top scores, the winners, and the falls
India won the Gaprindashvili Cup (named after the fifth women's world chess champion Nona Gaprindashvili, and also the first woman grandmaster to receive the title in 1978), awarded in recognition of the aggregate performance of its open and women's teams, with 34 match points, as well as the best performance in the additional tiebreaks.
Three teams vied for the cup – India, India B, and the USA. But India, with its superior tiebreak, emerged the winner.
But, fell to the United States in the decisive final round of the Women's Chess Olympiad, dropping to an overall third place. Ukraine and Georgia tied for top place with a 3-1 victory against Poland and Azerbaijan respectively. Using the tie-breaker, Ukraine came out on top, while Georgia settled for second place. The Indian Team was placed third, taking home the bronze medal.
First-seeded United States (who beat 21st-seeded Turkey 3-1) and second-seeded India (who beat 13th-seeded Iran 2.5-1.5) were tied, with Team India winning 2 on 16 match points, keeping its medal chances alive.
India won its match against Kazakhstan 3.5-0.5, extending its lead in the FIDE Women's Chess Olympiad standings to 17 points. With 16 points each, heading into the final round, Slovakia, Azerbaijan, Ukraine, & Georgia were all tied for the second to fifth places.
Due to the razor-thin margin of one match point separating the leaders in the Open & Women's divisions from their nearest pursuers, a tense final round was expected in both divisions.
The complete list of final positions for the team as well as individual performances can be obtained from the official website for the Olympiad:
https://chessolympiad.fide.com/open-standings.
Milestones etched in pain
No one did a happy dance or gave a high five as Anna Ushenina, after rescuing a draw at the hands of Poland's Oliwia Kiolbasa ensured Ukraine's gold medal at the Chess Olympiad.
The gold medal, an Olympic gold at that, provided only momentary solace.
Kharkiv, Ukraine, home of 36-year-old Ushenina, the country's first female world champion, and one of the cities brutally shelled during the invasion, lies only 30 miles from the Russian border. In Ushenina’s painful words, “it was undoubtedly a wonderful feeling, however, the medal can't halt a war."
This veteran player still hasn't returned home, just like the rest of her squad. The five-person crew all have interesting tales of hardship to tell. Anna and Mariya Muzychuk endured a perilous journey to safety in Spain and Germany after fleeing their home in Lviv, a town in western Ukraine that borders Poland.
Conclusion
It was a milestone for India and the State of Tamil Nadu to bring the FIDE Chess Olympiad to India, for the first time since the first Olympiad in 1927. Choosing Chennai as the venue fits the bill further as the southern city is widely regarded as the national capital of chess. Home to the major chunk of teen prodigies in Indian Chess - from the five times world champion and the now FIDE Deputy Chairman Viswanathan Anand to Teen wonder Praggnanandhaa - Chennai and the government of Tamil Nadu triumphed in bringing the Olympiad back to Asia after a gap of 30 years.