Two weeks before the start of theFIDE Candidates Tournament, we provide the latest news and address the question that is on everyone's mind: Who will win?

This article, originally posted on March 3, has been updated on March 6 to reflect that Vachier-Lagrave is replacing Radjabov.

The first round of the most important tournament of the year is scheduled for March 17, 14 days from now. GMs Fabiano Caruana, Ding Liren,Alexander Grischuk,Ian Nepomniachtchi, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave,Anish Giri,Wang Hao, and Kirill Alekseenko will fight for the right to challenge GM Magnus Carlsen in the next world championship match which is likely to start December 20 in Dubai.

First, an update about Ding and Wang, related to the coronavirus. According to the latest information, Wang is still in Japan, from there he will travel to Russia normally. Meanwhile, Ding has arrived in Russia already and is undergoing a 14-day quarantine with the rest of the Chinese delegation.

In other recent news, the March FIDE ratings are out, so we know with which ratings the players will be playing. Here's the updated players' list, with changes only for Wang (who won four points in Gibraltar) and Alekseenko (who lost six points, also in Gibraltar, and dropped below 2700):

2020 Candidates Tournament | Participants

Unsurprisingly, things have been somewhat quiet around these players as they have been focusing on preparing for the tournament. None of them have played over-the-board chess since Wijk aan Zee and Gibraltar finished.

However, more than half the field found time during their preparation to play in thePRO Chess League this month. For instance, Caruana has played 24 games for the Saint Louis Arch Bishops in 2020, half of these in February. So far he scored 16.5 points, good for a 2764 performance rating.

Both Grischuk (23.5/32, TPR 2776) and Giri (7/8, TPR 2940) have played for the Canada Chessbrahs, and in fact, both of them were part of last night's victory against the Sweden Wasabis.

"I'm actually done. All openings have been refuted, everything's done!" joked Giri about combining his Candidates prep with playing online.

Don't miss GM Robert Hess and WFM Alexandra Botez's interview with Giri from last night's PRO Chess League stream, starting at 1:19:32, where the Dutchman also reveals that he has a team member that doesn't like to watch movies, saying it's too late to fire him now!

"I'm actually done. All openings have been refuted, everything's done!" Anish Giri

Whether his league games will help him in Yekaterinburg will have to be seen, but his Candidates preparation definitely helped him for yesterday's games:

"You can't imagine how much stuff that you look at during a serious preparation you deem sort of to be somewhat second rate. Then, by now I've got like three, four, five bonus repertoires I can play so in that sense I think I am very well prepared for an event like today," said Giri.

Here's his win against GM Nils Grandelius from yesterday's match, which wasn't an unimportant line from the Gruenfeld:

Meanwhile, Girihas been sharing some views from his training camp.On Instagram, the Dutchman uploaded a few pictures that revealed a beach location somewhere in Portugal, the presence of GMs Erwin l'Ami and Jorden van Foreest, and basically everyone having a pretty good time:

As Giri explained, it wasn't just fun: "Let me explain that my sponsors and supporters don't think I am wasting resources on ice cream and football! There is nothing to take a picture of during the hard work, which is like nine hours a day, and in that spare half an hour when I am eating ice cream or playing football, I take a picture and then it looks like all I do is eat ice cream and play football. You're not gonna share a screenshot with your latest ideas in the Najdorf."

That is actually an error that has happened before; the Saint Louis Chess Club released a video during the early phase of the 2018 Carlsen-Caruana world championship match that showed a screenshot of Caruana's analysis against the Petroff.

Also during the PRO Chess League, now three weeks ago, it was suggested that Caruana might have made a somewhat similar little error:

Two more players have played in the PRO Chess League this season. Still at his home in Wenzhou, Ding scored 3.5/4 for the China Pandas (TPR 2759) on February 17, and Nepomniachtchi scored 7/8 (TPR 2930) in matches in January and February for the Russia Wizards.

Apart from FIDE launching theofficial website and publishing a promo video, this is all the recent news available now.

The easy answer is: Caruana or Ding. It's quite obvious that they, as the only two 2800+ players competing, are the two clear favorites as compared to the rest of the field. But how much are they favored? What do the experts say?

First, the bookies. Unibet, who recently closed a sponsorship deal with Carlsen, still has a slight preference for Caruana over Ding. Grischuk and Nepomniachtchi are the biggest dark horses, followed by Giri:

GM Viswanathan Anand told Chess.com that he also puts Caruana first and Ding second, followed by Grischuk. In Ben Johnson's The Perpetual Chess Podcast, Anand elaborated:

"Ding's strength is that he plays very well in these super top tournaments. He's very solid. Something like the Candidates is really designed for his style. On the other hand, Fabi is scoring very high. He was plus-five in Isle of Man, he was plus-seven in Wijk aan Zee... If he wins more games than the other guys are able to do, because it's normally a low-scoring event, then people may never catch up."

Ding's strength is that he plays very well in these super top tournaments. He's very solid. Something like the Candidates is really designed for his style. Vishy Anand

"I think it really comes down to these two, and I would put the other six in the basket of surprise. Anything other than these two I would consider a surprise for me."

GM Garry Kasparov shared his thoughts during the live broadcast of the Cairns Cup. He went as far as putting Caruana and Ding three-to-one against the field: "They are huge favorites. You need a natural disaster for one of them not to win."

"They are huge favorites. You need a natural disaster for one of them not to win." Garry Kasparov

He continued: "If Ding qualifies, we can expect a major boom in China provided it can sort out some of the problems that China is facing these days. I will be curious to see the effect on Chinese chess. Of course, if he wins thats one story, but if he doesnt win, it will generate the ongoing effect. Chess in China is promising, but having a candidate for the title is a different story.

Can you play like Ding Liren?

Try our Play Like Ding Liren course featuring five of Ding's best games!

"Somehow I think Magnus would prefer Caruana although Fabi already has the experience. The only advantage is that Ding could take on Magnus in rapid and blitz. Fabi is not as great in these disciplines. But as we saw, he could be really dangerous for Magnus in classical chess. Lets not forget, in the last two matches, Magnuss performance in classical chess was far from convincing."

Update March 9: All this was based on Radjabov in the field, who has now been replaced by Vachier-Lagrave. Today Kasparov tweeted:

Two American top grandmasters also see Caruna as the favorite. GM Wesley So, interviewed after the Speed Chess Championship final, said:

"Fabiano, obviously. I hope he didn't use all of his good chess in Wijk aan Zee. But if he plays good chess and if he keeps up the good form that he has the last few months, I would give him a very high chance to win. I mean, it's hard for me to think that anybody else could win other than Ding and Fabiano, but also Ding doesn't win too many tournaments per year. I mean, Ding is very consistent, but he doesn't have very dominating performances like Fabiano."

So and Nakamura talking about the Candidates after playing the Speed Chess Championship final.

GM Hikaru Nakamura, in the same interview: "Fabiano is the clear favorite. He played very well in Wijk, unlike last time. If it's not Fabiano, I would say Ding is the only player I see. Outside chance maybe Grischuk or Nepo, but I don't think anybody else has a chance of winning realistically."

GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, who narrowly missed out on qualifying for the Candidates, has Caruana as the favorite too and puts Caruana and Ding one-to-one against the field. The biggest outsider, in his opinion, is Giri.

Who do you think will win the Candidates and WHY!?

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Who Will Win The FIDE Candidates Tournament? - Chess.com

Vladimir Kramnik will commentate live for chess24 on the first eight rounds of the 2020 FIDE Candidates Tournament. The 14th World Chess Champion will be joined by Jan Gustafsson and Lawrence Trent, while former World Championship Challenger Nigel Short will then step in for Vladimir for the final six rounds. The 8-player Candidates Tournament starts on 17th March in Yekaterinburg, Russia and will determine who plays Magnus Carlsen in a World Championship match this December.

The Candidates Tournament is the second most important event in chess and arguably the most exciting. Eight players will face each other twice over a gruelling 14 rounds to decide Magnus Carlsens next challenger, and no-one will be holding anything back. Its been gruelling even before it began this year, with Teimour Rajdabov sensationally dropping out over coronavirus fears, meaning French no. 1 Maxime Vachier-Lagrave finally got the chance to play a Candidates Tournament.

The best place to watch will be right here on chess24, since were privileged to have Vladimir Kramnik commentating live on the first eight rounds. In 2000 Big Vlad pulled off the almost impossible winning a World Championship match against a Garry Kasparov who was still at the height of his powers. Vladimir held on to the title for seven years (defending it against Peter Leko and Veselin Topalov) and although he retired from classical chess last year he still won bronze in the 2019 World Blitz Championship just a few months ago. Here he is beating Alireza Firouzja in brilliant style in the penultimate round:

Nigel Short has also played a World Championship match against Garry Kasparov and will be reunited with Grandmaster Jan Gustafsson, after the pair previously commentated together on the GRENKE Chess Classic. The plan is to have Jan together with Vladimir and then Nigel in our main Hamburg studio, while Lawrence Trent will be next door introducing our FantasyChess Contest, quizzes and more. We also hope to have a certain Magnus Carlsen phoning into the show from time to time!

Heres the full commentary schedule in English:

March 17, 12:00 CET:Round 1 | Vladimir Kramnik, Jan Gustafsson & Lawrence Trent March 18, 12:00 CET:Round 2 | Vladimir Kramnik, Jan Gustafsson & Lawrence Trent March 19, 12:00 CET:Round 3 | Vladimir Kramnik, Jan Gustafsson & Lawrence Trent March 20: REST DAY

March 21, 12:00 CET:Round 4 | Vladimir Kramnik, Jan Gustafsson & Lawrence Trent March 22, 12:00 CET:Round 5 | Vladimir Kramnik, Jan Gustafsson & Lawrence Trent March 23, 12:00 CET: Round 6 | Vladimir Kramnik, Jan Gustafsson & Lawrence Trent March 24: REST DAY

March 25, 12:00 CET:Round 7 | Vladimir Kramnik, Jan Gustafsson & Lawrence Trent March 26, 12:00 CET: Round 8 | Vladimir Kramnik, Jan Gustafsson & Lawrence Trent March 27, 12:00 CET: Round 9 | Nigel Short, Jan Gustafsson & Lawrence Trent March 28: REST DAY

March 29, 13:00 CEST:Round 10 | Nigel Short, Jan Gustafsson & Lawrence Trent March 30, 13:00 CEST:Round 11 | Nigel Short, Jan Gustafsson & Lawrence Trent March 31, 13:00 CEST:Round 12 | Nigel Short, Jan Gustafsson & Lawrence Trent April 1: REST DAY

April 2, 13:00 CEST:Round 13 | Nigel Short, Jan Gustafsson & Lawrence Trent April 3, 12:00 CEST:Round 14 | Nigel Short, Jan Gustafsson & Lawrence Trent April 4:Tiebreaks/ Closing Ceremony

We're also going to have commentary at least in:

You can find the full pairings, and the starting times wherever you are now, by clicking on any of the games below to go to our broadcast page. Thats where youll find the commentary as well as computer analysis of all the moves, chat, a 7-million game database and much more:

For a preview of the 2020 Candidates Tournament check out the following video series by Magnus Carlsen seconds Laurent Fressinet, Jan Gustafsson and Peter Heine Nielsen (a Maxime Vachier-Lagrave update is coming soon after he was a late addition to the line-up!):

Weve also been taking a look at the players in a series of articles based on those videos. So far we have:

If you take out a Premium Membership now you can not only watch that 5-hour series and dozens more for free, but during the Candidates Tournament broadcast youll be eligible for special Premium-only prizes from our FantasyChess competition.

Read more about FantasyChess and get involved now!

There will also be other quizzes and contests and a chance to take on some of our commentators in Banter Blitz.

There are three special promotions on offer (sorry Anish!) depending on the voucher code you enter when you go to our Premium page- GIRIDRAW, KRAMNIK_MUG or CANDIDATES2020:

We hope youll join us for one of the most exciting events in chess!

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Kramnik & Short to commentate on the Candidates - chess24

3/15/2020 Many young players used the Aeroflot Open to gather some tournament experience. Some of their names are not so familiar. One of them, 14 year old Aydin Suleymanli, made himself a name by simply winning the tournament. THORSTEN CMIEL introduces the next generation. | Photo: ChessBase India

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It turns out to be a great method to follow players who are improving their practical skill level in all phases. Watching their games and analysing the interesting moments, is a good way to improve the own chess skill level. Talented young players show a chess performance explosion ever so often. In Moscow, two new outstanding talents have entered the world stage.

The risk appetite among most strongest youth players is higher than that of the saturated top of the world. This is why Alireza was able to challenge the chess elite in Wijk aan Zee and spread a bit of fear and terror. At least with the white pieces, he often goes straight for the king which is rather unusual for super grand masters. Normally Alireza is traditionally participating in Moscow, but this time he surprisingly received an invitation as a substitute in Prague, which he won, and had to pass at Aeroflot due to overlap. In Moscow, some other young talents were showing that they could soon follow the Iranian to Olympus.

A colorful mix of exciting moments and games show how confidently young players with ambitions play for victory. Older players tend to lose their breath in the last rounds. Not so with many juniors, who have enough stamina to prepare themselves just as meticulously for the final rounds as they do for the first ones.

In 2020 the AzerbaijaniAydin Suleymanli, born in 2005, won the world's strongest open tournament at the age of 14. His score of 7 out of 9 in Moscow corresponded to a performance of 2791 points. For comparison, Vincent Keymer's performance with 8 out of 9 at the Grenke Open 2018 represented a performance of 2795 against significantly weaker opponents. Historically, there was someone a girl in fact who was more successful:

In 1989 in Rome, Sofia Polgar, at the age of 14, achieved one of the best measurable chess achievements and made history.

Her result of 8 out of 9 corresponded to a performance of 2879 according to New in Chess. Incidentally, the younger sister of Sofia, Judit, was already number 1 in the women's world ranking at the age of twelve.

Sofia Polgar was able to keep a better overview than her opponents, especially in tactically complicated positions. In particular with black, she was often worse off after the opening phase, but she showed her extraordinary fighting qualities.

Judit and Sofie Polgar 1988 | Photo: Gerhard HundGFHund /CC BY

The winner inMoscow told ChessBase India a few months ago that he no longer went to school and already saw himself as a chess professional. His coach is Farid Abbasov, an Azerbaijani grandmaster who isnt very active himself. Aydin is currently the reigning U14 world champion and has recently improved his results. At the European Club Cup, for example, Aydin achieved a performance of over 2700 with an opponent average of 2487 with 5.5 out of 7. With his victory, he achieved a grandmaster norm, won 38 Elo points and advanced to an Elo rating of over 2500 points for the first time.

Aydin performed well particularly in the second half of the tournament by scoring a full point three times in a row in round 6, 7 and 8. The youngster was very convincing in his game against Parham Maghsoodloo.

Photo: Eteri Kublashvili

In the first half of the tournament, a twelve-year-old Indian (born in 2007) dominated the field in Moscow. After losing to Rauf Mamedarov in the middle of the tournament, he seemed to be running out of breath. After six rounds, he already had at least an eight-round grandmaster norm and even exceeded it by winning the last round with a point. His performance of 2707 points continues to attract attention. Bharath is a student from the Ramesh performance group in Chennai and has already collected several titles in children's chess. His trainer was delighted with this success. Bharath can theoretically break Karjakin's age record as the youngest grandmaster of all time.

The Russian is an international champion with a current rating of 2442. His result of five points against an opposing average of 2590 corresponded to a performance of 2633 and brought him an increase of 23 rating points.

Arseniy seems to want to follow the example of his compatriot Esipenko and initially refrain from gaining less important titles (IM, FM). With a rating of 2501, the Russian was number set as starting position 67. Aside from his brutal loss against Praggnanandhaa in the final round, he played a solid tournament, reaching a performance of 2618 and a grandmaster norm.

Another Azeri achieved a grand master norm in Moscow with a performance of 2604. He played in the B-Open and gained 22 points in Moscow.

The Belarusian narrowly failed to gain the grandmaster norm. She entered the A-Open with an Elo rating of 2404 and earned 50 percent with an opposing average of 2587. Her performance is all the more remarkable if you take a look at the current women's world rankings. The Indian Koneru Humpy has just become the new number 2 at 2586.

The Indian is FIDE Master and achieved an IM norm with a performance of 2528. At the beginning of the tournament, he was even on track for a grand master norm for a long time.

In addition to the title hunters, there were of course some other well-known teenagers who are already grandmasters or have long since had their grandmaster norms. Praggnanandhaa, currently number 12 in the junior world rankings in March 2020, was unable to exploit a number of promising positions, although it looked good for him in the beginning. For Nodirbek Abdusattorov things were not going so well in Moscow this time, and he lost 17 rating points.

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New faces at the Aeroflot Open - Chessbase News

The Talmud is wrong, Al Pacinos character says in the first episode of Hunters. Living well is not the best revenge. You know what the best revenge is? Revenge.

The show, which premiered in late February, follows Pacino as Meyer Offerman, a wealthy Holocaust survivor in 1977 New York who leads a band of misfit killers on a mission to torture and murder as many former Nazis as they can. Meanwhile, a new generation of white supremacists infiltrates the U.S. government and plans to institute a Fourth Reich to pick up where Adolf Hitler left off. The two groups soon begin killing each other in increasingly brutal ways.

The shows storytelling is clumsy, an uneven cross between the campy gore of Quentin Tarantinos Inglourious Basterds (2009) and the self-serious melodrama of Orson Welless The Stranger (1946). In one scene, Meyer and his gang crack lighthearted jokes as they slaughter Americas favorite enemies. But then, in overdramatic flashbacks to Auschwitz, we are reminded that Nazis are no laughing matter. These tonal jumps are disorienting, and the confusion is heightened by the fact that rookie writer and director David Weil throws in a circuitous subplot involving a lesbian FBI agent on the trail of Nazi infiltrators in NASA.

Weil attempts to tie the plot of Hunters together with an ongoing conversation between Meyer and his protege Jonah Heidelman (Logan Lerman). The question is whether it is fairer to deliver the Nazis justice or mercy. But during the final episode, Weil abandons the question almost completely. In a bizarre twist, Jonah learns that Meyer is no Jew at all, but rather a self-hating Nazi making amends for his war crimes by slaughtering his former compatriots.

After more than 10 hours of gratuitous violence pasted over with Meyers wry invocations of the Torah and Talmud, the revelation is jarring. If this were Philip Roth, we would have been treated to a whole other story agonizing over Jewish identity. But since this is post-prestige TV, Weil moves right on to the next twist: Hitler and his lover Eva Braun are still alive and apparently cavorting in Argentina no doubt a setup for a second season.

If we get one, I hope Weil will have matured. Hunters is an example of a beginner swinging for the fences in almost every way imaginable and missing every time.

The shows failure became apparent only two days after it dropped, when the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum in Poland denounced it for a depiction of sadistic torture that took place inside the camps. In the scene in question, a Nazi forces a Jewish chess champion to play him in a game of human chess. The Nazis and the Jew call out moves, and the various players move around the board, killing each other as directed. An aerial shot shows hundreds of naked, dead bodies rotting in the sun as the masterminds move their chess players.

The scene is horrific. It also has no basis in fact, which the museum was quick to point out on Twitter.

Inventing a fake game of human chess for @huntersonprime is not only dangerous foolishness & caricature, the museum wrote. It also welcomes future deniers. We honor the victims by preserving factual accuracy.

Weil wrote a long response, saying that he invented the episode to show respect to the victims of the Holocaust without borrowing from a real persons specific life or experience. He explained that the chess scene was a representationally truthful story intended to powerfully counteract the revisionist narrative that whitewashes Nazi perpetration of crimes against Jews.

Weil added that his own grandmother was a Holocaust survivor and that the show is largely dedicated to her memory and the memory of others who survived the camps. He said that he went to great lengths to avoid misrepresenting a real person or borrowing from a specific moment in an actual persons life.

That was the responsibility that weighed on me every night and every morning for years, while writing, producing, editing this show, he wrote. It is the thing I go to sleep thinking about and the thing I wake up working to honor.

Attempting to respect the victims of the Holocaust is a noble sentiment, but making up stories about them is an odd way to do it. Nearly every work of art that doesnt hew closely to the gruesome, well-documented facts of the Shoah comes off poorly. Classics such as The Boys From Brazil (1978) and Marathon Man (1976) now seem like paranoia-inflected fantasies. Inglourious Basterds is commercialized bloodlust. Even Roberto Begninis Academy Award-winning Life is Beautiful (1997), so beloved upon its release, seems naive and tone-deaf in hindsight.

The Holocaust is one of the great human tragedies in living memory. Depicting it in art will always be difficult, and for some, impossible. The unskilled had best to stick to Theodor Adornos maxim: There can be no poetry after Auschwitz.

Nicholas Rowan is a staff writer for the Washington Examiner.

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Hunters botches the Holocaust - Washington Examiner

Chennai, March 10 (IANS): On the International Women's Day when Prime Minister Narendra Modi handed over his social media accounts to seven women, the Tamil Nadu State Chess Association and its affiliate Erode District Chess Circle denied a mother and daughter to write the chess arbiter's examination.

A total of five persons from Erode including the two women were not allowed to write the arbiter's exam that was held on March 8 despite paying Rs 1,000 each as exam fees.

"I had been preparing for the arbiter exam for 15 days. I didn't expect the Secretary of Erode District Chess Circle not accepting the exam application and forwarding that to Tamil Nadu State Chess Association (TNSCA)," T.Kanmane, a former Erode district chess player told IANS.

Kanmane is a qualified teacher for mentally retarded teacher. She is working in a school for mentally retarded children.

As per the arbiter exam procedure, an aspirant should route his/her application through the district chess association. The Secretary of the District Chess Association has to give his nod/recommendation in the exam form so that a candidate can write the exam.

According to Kanmane, an email was sent to Tamil Nadu State Chess Association saying that the Secretary of its Erode district affiliate did not accept and forward the exam application, but of no avail.

Not only Kanmane, even the exam applications her mother T.Intherane and her father N. Thirugnanasampandam were not accepted by the Erode District Chess Circle.

"For the past several years we have been organising chess tournaments in Erode. This time we thought of writing the arbiter's exam and get ourselves qualified," Thirugnanasampandam told IANS.

"I used to play in 1980s and also used to lend a helping hand to tournament organisers as an unofficial arbiter. RecentlyA I came to know about arbiter exams and decided to write the same to become a qualified arbiter," S. Kalyanasundaram whose was not allowed to write the exam despite paying the fees told IANS.

For all the five persons former Secretary of the then Erode District Chess Association R. Nachimuthu acted as the coordinator on the exam matter.

"The five persons who are all members of Erode Mavatta Chaduranga Kazhagam had asked me to do the needful like submitting the application forms to the Erode District Chess Circle and other related work," Nachimuthu, Executive Committee Member of the Kazhagam told IANS.

He said the Erode District Chess Circle Secretary S.Ramesh did not accept the exam applications and was not reachable on phone.

Nachimuthu said as the exam date was nearing, he had sent the applications directly to Tamil Nadu State Chess Association, but he nor the applicants have not received any reply from the state chess body.

When contacted for his comments Ramesh, Secretary of Erode District Chess Circle told IANS: "These people had never lent a helping hand for the events organised by the official body. They also hold their own events. Will you allow a non-journalist into your journalist association?"

Tamil Nadu State Chess Association Secretary P. Stephen Balasamy was not available for comments when contacted by IANS.

It may be recalled last October, 11-year old school boy Karthick Rahul was arbitrarily evicted from The Hindu Tamil Nadu State Level Chess Tournament Tirunelveli Under-13 midway by the secretary of Tirunelveli District Chess Development Association (TDCDA) in Tamil Nadu for playing in tournament that was not affiliated to the district or state associations and AICF.

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2 Erode women not allowed to write chess arbiter exam in TN - Daijiworld.com

The push-and-pull going on between Tom Brady and the Patriots has a familiar feel to it.

If youre Ty Law, or any other elite former Patriot who has tussled with Bill Belichick over money or respect listening to all the back-and-forth fodder with regard to Bradys free agency isnt surprising.

The Hall of Fame cornerback certainly had his contract battles with the Hoodie in the past. It came to a head in 2005, when the three-time Super Bowl winner was released after 10 seasons due in part to his $12.5 million cap hit.

Its a chess match going on right now, Law said Wednesday, when reached on the West Coast.

He gets it.

Like so many, he doesnt want Brady to leave the Patriots. He wants the 4-time Super Bowl MVP to finish his career with the same team he started with in 2000. But Law also has the perspective of being in New England himself and making Belichick make a hard choice.

He knows you dont always get what you wish for.

Ive said this a few times already. Hes given us 20 years. Hopefully (Brady) doesnt leave. No one wants to see Tom Brady leave New England, said Law, who won three Super Bowls with the quarterback. If he stays, he gets to do something not too many people get to do. But at the same time, theres all the all-time greats that have left. Look at Jerry Rice, Joe Montana, Emmitt Smith. The list goes on other great Hall of Famers. They move on.

While Law is on a mission these days to promote his new venture hes now tackling a partnership with V-One Vodka he couldnt help but weigh in further on Bradys pending free agency.

For whatever his reasons are, whatever happens, I dont think theres any right or wrong to whatever (Bradys) decision is, said Law. Its the best decision for Tom Brady. And whatever it is, none of us know.

But if he leaves, guess what? Hes still going to have a statue out in the stadium at some point because he deserves that, Law went on. Hes always going to be synonymous with the New England Patriots.

After Law was sent packing by Belichick, he went on to play with four other teams and retired in 2009.

He said he doesnt have any inside information about Bradys future, or where his former teammate and friend might end up. Law expects Belichick will extend an offer and keep Brady if thats what he thinks is best for the organization. And if Belichick decides its better for the Patriots to go on without the GOAT, and leave Brady to make a choice outside of New England, there was a report Wednesday that the Buccaneers are going all in for him.

(Belichick) released me. He releases a lot of people. No one is exempt, even though some are more difficult decisions than others, Law said. But Tom got here because Belichick wasnt afraid to make the difficult decision when it came to Drew (Bledsoe). Or Lawyer Malloy, or (Richard) Seymour. Its a business at the end of the day.

And Tom has to make a business decision. If he wants to play his last few years somewhere else because I think its beyond money at this point. Its like, maybe theres a challenge with a change of scenery.

If thats the case, Law says wish No. 12 well.

I say best of luck to him whatever decision he makes in the end, and the same for the organization, said Law. He gave 20 years of his life. People need to stay off his back, leave him alone, let him live and if he leaves, what? Football is still going to be played whether he stays or leaves. Football is still happening.

No matter this outcome, fans in New England are going to have to get used to not having Brady behind center in Foxboro at some point. Its going to happen eventually. As Belichick would say, it is what it is.

At some point, Tom Brady is not going to be suiting up for the New England Patriots. At some point, were all going to have to get over it, and move on, said Law. Its not an end (for the Patriots). All good things come to an end, whether its his choice, or not his choice. So right now he has a choice for what hes going to do, so let him live.

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Ty Law weighs in on chess match between Tom Brady and Patriots - Boston Herald

The World Junior Championship 1987 was a very special event for me. Since it took place in Baguio City (Philippines), it was my first opportunity to travel outside of the "iron curtain" and see the world's top junior players. In those prehistoric times, young players were not spoiled with an abundance of tournaments, so the whole world's junior elite took part in the championship. I knew for sure that a future world champion (or even champions) was playing in the beautiful convention center, and I even could predict who they were. The easiest candidate for the future world title to predict was Viswanathan Anand.

During our training camp before the world championship, we studied the games of our future opponents. Long before computers and databases changed the way chess players study chess, we had a bunch of folders with Xerox copies of our opponent's games. I still have some of them Of all the foreign opponents, Anand looked like the most dangerous one. We heard all kinds of legends about the speed of his play. Our coaches were showing a game from the previous World Junior Championship where Anand beat the Soviet representative, future super-GM Bareev, and spent about 15 minutes for the whole game!

Yes, White's play was very logical and strong, but how it was humanely possible to play such a beautiful game in just 15 minutes? During the World Junior Championship in 1987, Anand kept playing very fast. In fact, I was telling everyone that I pushed Anand into severe time trouble because he spent 40 minutes in our game. (The time control was 40 moves in two hours, then 20 moves in one hour, and then the game would be adjourned.

When it was Ivanchuk's turn to play Anand, I told him that he should do anything he can to avoid time trouble. "You get into a time trouble, you are a toast!", was my final advice.

Ivanchuk didn't get into time trouble, yet he was gradually outplayed and eventually lost the game:

After the game, he accused me of giving him very bad advice. "I played too fast, and that's why I lost," he said. One way or another, the tournament was practically decided at that point. Nevertheless, in the last round at some point, I had a theoretical chance to catch Anand. He was losing against GM Gad Rechlis from Israel. Ivanchuk offered a draw to GM Pavel Blatny, and I had a very promising attack against GM Simen Agdestein (the future coach of Magnus Carlsen). For a couple of minutes, my thoughts were occupied with math: If Anand loses, Blatny agrees a draw, and I win, there would be a three-way tie for first, and since we all played top players, who knows who would have a better tie break? Pretty soon I got a blunt dose of reality: Anand survived, Blatny rejected Ivanchuk's draw offer and lost, and my beautiful-looking attack unexpectedly fizzled out. As a result, Anand became the new World Junior Champion, Ivanchuk was second, and I got the bronze medal. Unfortunately, I missed a historic chance to appear in the same picture as Anand, which I mentioned in my old article.

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While I was pretty happy about my result being just slightly behind these two geniuses, Ivanchuk was disappointed by his performance. The loss against Anand clearly bothered him. To make things worse, the very next year he lost a beautiful miniature to Anand. Can you find Black's final shot?

The next duel between these two superstars took place in the famous Linares tournament. That was probably Ivanchuk's best performance ever. Not only did he convincingly win the super tournament, but he also beat the world champion, Kasparov. Anand was one of numerous Ivanchuk's victims. Find a textbook break that demolished White's position.

By that time the whole chess world was well aware of the unique talent of both players, and therefore a match between Anand and Ivanchuk took place next year in Linares. It was another major disappointment for Ivanchuk. Not only did he lose the match, but the quality of Anand's play was also better. The next game is a true strategic masterpiece. Can you find a remarkable sequence of Black moves?

That's simply unbelievable! Black broke all known positional rules: He damaged his kingside pawn structure, gave White an outside passed h-pawn, and traded his "good" bishop for his opponent's "bad" bishop. Despite this, his grand plan came to fruition: He got his central passed pawns and won the game!

Many years after this match, Ivanchuk mentioned in one of his interviews that he sees every new game vs. Anand as a continuation of their match. I saw firsthand Ivanchuk's reaction after his loss to Anand in their first game. It seems to me that for Ivanchuk, every new game versus Anand is a continuation of their rivalry that started in 1987.

To be continued...

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A Match That Lasts The Whole Life: Anand vs Ivanchuk - Chess.com

Feb. 17, 2020, 9:30 AM UTC

Alexandra Botez was sitting in her apartment on a recent Friday in front of three computer monitors, a webcam and a microphone and losing at chess.

"This is not looking good, but this guy is not very fast," Botez said. "He's not good or fast, so hopefully we're going to win this game."

Botez, 24, is good and fast. She holds the title of Woman FIDE Master, was the first female president of the Stanford University Chess Club and remains one of the best players in Canada. And under normal circumstances, she probably wouldn't be losing to her anonymous online opponent.

But on the monitor to her right, Botez was also talking to more than 1,000 viewers who were watching the game as she offered a mix of live commentary, trash talk and thanks to the viewers who had given her contributions.

Players like Botez now serve as some of the most visible ambassadors of chess and, it can be argued, the game's first entertainers. If chess hustling turned pro, it would look something like what Botez does.

Botez, who said she used to enjoy hustling people when she was an 8-year-old chess phenom, now punishes most of her opponents online, sans the gambling. But she's not perfect.

In this game, she's down some material chess shorthand for having fewer pieces but her opponent had less than 30 seconds left on his clock.

"Let's hope we can flag this guy," she said, meaning her opponent would run out of time. He didn't, and she ended up checkmated.

Seconds later, she was starting a new game against a new opponent. Such is the life of a full-time chess livestreamer.

About six days a week, Botez sits in front of these monitors to play chess and interact with people on the internet. She's part of a growing scene of chess players who have followed in the footsteps of people who livestream themselves playing popular video games such as "Fortnite" or "League of Legends." While competitive esports has become a lucrative and growing market, popular personalities such as Tyler Blevins (better known as Ninja) who stream themselves playing games are among the market's biggest stars.

And while chess is far smaller as an esport than video games, it has grown quickly. On Twitch, the most popular internet platform to livestream esports, time spent watching chess has risen by more than 500 percent since 2016, according to data from the company. With that consumption has come some money, mostly donations from viewers facilitated by Twitch but also in sponsorship dollars.

That growth persuaded Botez in September to try livestreaming chess full time. She now has more than 60,000 followers on Twitch.

And while streaming is offering players like Botez a new way to make a living from their chess skills, it's also giving new life to one of the oldest games in the world.

"It's crazy to me to have this kind of support and this kind of viewership online for chess," Botez said. "Chess has always been a passion of mine, but it was never something that was popular. It was never something I would have imagined would have grown to what it is today."

Chess came to the attention of Twitch less than four years ago, when the company formed a partnership with Chess.com, the largest chess website, with almost 33 million members.

"Across all the different various competitive games on Twitch, chess has seen some of the most substantial growth in the same period of time than any other esport in the world," said Justin Dellario, Twitch's vice president of global esports.

The rise of esports both in terms of competitive gaming and more social online gaming first gained attention in the 1990s and the early 2000s before emerging in the past 10 years. The gaming and esports market research company Newzoo forecast that 2019 esports revenues would hit $1.1 billion. Twitch is by far the largest esports platform.

Chess hasn't enjoyed similar growth. While the game has a young, marketable genius in world champion Magnus Carlsen, it has struggled to attract the kind of money that can help sustain its growth.

"There have been times, even historically, where a world championship hasn't even been held because there wasn't enough sponsorship money," said Nick Barton, director of business development for Chess.com.

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Chessbrah is the first company built around chess streaming. Grandmaster Eric Hansen, 27, first used the term "Chessbrah" in 2015 as an online alias, and later he streamed under the name. He's credited with being one of the first people to make chess streaming its own niche esport. Chessbrah now has almost 100,000 followers on Twitch.

"I grew up watching wrestling and reality shows," Hansen said. "And that actually was a big influence."

He built up his own channel and recruited other chess players to help. Chessbrah now has six full-time programmers for its Twitch and YouTube channels. It sells hoodies, T-shirts and hats on its website, encouraging people to "join the new chess culture."

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Hansen said he sees a lot of upside for chess. He pointed to its history, its global reach and the notion that people don't need expensive computers to play it.

And many streamers aren't grandmasters like Hansen. Some are novices who are learning along with their audiences, Dellario said. He pointed to GoldDustTori, who has streamed for more than a year and started boosting her rating by more than 600 points.

While streaming isn't bringing in enough money to change the economics of the game, the prospect of streamers' attracting more people to the game and providing a way to engage with it more often could open the door to more sponsorship money, which has generally been hard to capture.

And some major chess tournaments have shown the potential to turn into major events. Twitch said the 2018 World Chess Championship attracted 4.4 million unique viewers.

The emergence of chess as an esport has also meant new avenues for players who might have otherwise moved on from the game. Botez is a prime example.

Chess players, particularly young ones who play the game at a high level, can end up burned out. Botez remembered asking her teachers to lie to her middle school classmates when she went to play in the North American championships because she was worried about fitting in. There were the hours of intense studying before big matches and the deflation after a disappointing performance. There was the tournament win that came with a college scholarship, an experience grueling enough to push her to take a break from the game.

And she never planned on turning pro.

"It wasn't fun anymore," Botez said.

Her story is a familiar one in the chess world that of an extremely talented player who may not make it to the top echelons of the game where players can make a living. Aside from teaching, there aren't many ways to make money playing chess. And there wasn't much for a casual or even semi-serious chess player to enjoy.

Even for a player of Botez's caliber, watching high-end chess games and commentary can be excruciatingly boring. Most competitive chess is played with long time allowances. Matches often last hours and end in draws.

"The broadcasts were super technical and so boring," Botez said. "I hated it."

Botez started streaming in college. It reminded her of some of her fondest memories of playing chess after tournaments were over or between rounds when players crowded around boards as people played blitz and bullet (variations of chess in which time limits are restricted to 10 minutes for each side or less) and talked some trash.

Some of her most notable livestreamed matches and most entertaining trash talk have come against grandmaster Ben Finegold. Botez grew up playing chess on the internet, but Finegold grew up playing "over the board," as real-world chess is known.

The son of a chess master, Finegold, 50, started playing competitively as the wave of attention that the American champion Bobby Fischer brought to the game in the early 1970s began to crest.

"It didn't take off after that as much as it should have," Finegold said. "Now, things are changing with the world of the internet and the fact that the U.S. is actually quite strong at chess."

Finegold climbed the ranks to become one of the top U.S. players from the 1990s through the 2010s. He became a grandmaster, the highest title given by the World Chess Federation, in 2010.

During that time, chess began to move online. The internet provided a way for people to play from the comfort of their homes against people around the world. The first internet chess server was set up in 1992, eventually becoming the Internet Chess Club, which is still in operation. Since then, numerous chess websites have sprung up, including Chess.com, Lichess and Chess24.

The vast majority of chess is now played online, Finegold said.

The introduction of video platforms also opened the door for more chess content to move online. Finegold taught at the Saint Louis Chess Club in the early 2010s, and the club began uploading his videos to YouTube.

Now, Finegold streams himself playing chess five to six times a week. His commentary usually includes a near-constant run of jokes, some of which poke fun at the peculiarities of online chess.

While Finegold grew up playing live chess in games that could often last for hours, most of his online games last less than 10 minutes. That means players, needing to move faster, often deviate from well-studied lines of play, known as theory.

"Still theory," Finegold will joke when launching a particularly bizarre series of moves that would never work in a longer game. (This is quite funny to chess enthusiasts.)

Winning is still paramount. When Botez streams, her competitiveness is evident and her tone can often match how she's playing. But livestreamed chess also brings a certain levity to mistakes.

Botez is particularly known in the chess world for the Botez Gambit. While many players have particular strategies (often called gambits) associated with their names, Botez's is unique. The Botez Gambit is now chess shorthand for accidentally losing one's queen, an often fatal error in a chess game.

It's something she's embraced. She's even got a compilation of Botez Gambits on YouTube.

It's an internet sensibility that might have been hard to imagine just a few years ago.

"It's OK if you make mistakes," she said. "Just move on in and have some fun with it."

And that's a feeling that isn't confined to the new guard. Finegold said he's looking forward to where streaming is going.

"Chess could be fun, too," Finegold said. "It doesn't have to be super serious all the time."

CORRECTION (Feb. 17, 2020, 10:42 a.m. ET): A previous version of this article misstated when Ben Finegold became a grandmaster. He achieved the title in 2010, not 2002.

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Fast-and-loose culture of esports is upending once staid world of chess - NBC News

By

RODNEY MUHUMUZA Associated Press

February 16, 2020, 4:10 PM

2 min read

KAMPALA, Uganda -- A Ugandan student who played a memorable role in a 2016 Disney film about a local chess prodigy has died at the age of 15.

Nikita Pearl Waligwa died on Saturday at a hospital near the Ugandan capital, Kampala. The cause was a brain tumor, according to the girls' secondary school she had attended since 2018.

She was "a darling to many, Gayaza High School said on .

Local media reported that Waligwa had been in and out of hospital with a recurring brain tumor and had previously received treatment, including surgery, in India.

Tributes were coming in for her on social media as Ugandans expressed sadness and recalled her role in the 2016 movie directed by Mira Nair and filmed in Kampala.

Queen of Katwe follows the rise of Ugandan chess prodigy Phiona Mutesi as a chess player amid grinding poverty in the Kampala slum of Katwe, with her single mother barely able to support her and her two siblings. Mutesi falls under the spell of an unassuming chess teacher who encourages the teenager to learn the game despite the skepticism of her mother, who warns her not to dream big because you will be disappointed.

The film was received favorably in Uganda, where young people with no acting experience shared the limelight with stars like Academy Award winner Lupita Nyongo. One of those Ugandans was Waligwa, who played Gloria, a chess player younger than Phiona who memorably said in the movie that in the game of chess the small one can become the big one.

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Young Ugandan who featured in a Disney chess film dies at 15 - ABC News

Young Chess Maestros from Soweto just came from representing the country in the nationals just a few weeks ago and one of them will still go further to play chess against the greatest minds in the world as she is going to play in an International Chess Tournament.

The thrilled coach Linda Makhubela expressed gratitude to the parents and guardians who have been hands-on in supporting the children participate in the classy and elegant game of chess, the chess club that meets in Diepkloof and Pimville has been diligent in participating in the game that is rarely played.

Knight Riders Chess Club (KRCC) went to play at the nationals against all the young great thinkers from the nation and coach Linda was excited and happy with his clubs performance and the resilient and determined spirit the children in his club bear.

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Makhubela said, I am so proud of the young ones in the club because they never let their spirit get damp because of being short of resources sometimes, whenever we go out to play, we try to take our A-game even though we often dont have that much support, we always strive to positively represent our country and our people.

The five-year-old Nokukhanya Chauke may be very young and tender, however, players in the chess fraternity already notice her as she will be representing South Africa for various upcoming chess tournaments.

Nosipho Chauke, Nokukhanya Chauke, and Noluthando Ntshalintshali.

Makhubela said, We are so happy for Nokukhanya and we know and trust that she will not disappoint us.

The coach further went to exclaim how his club also has a few kids who have qualified for the South African Junior Closed Championships.

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Soweto young Chess maestro to compete in an International Chess Tournament - Soweto Urban