Vishy Anand to give fresh blood chance
New Delhi: As hosts, not only will four Indian teams participate in the 44th Chess Olympiad for the first time, but the largest Indian contingent in the history of these Games is being fielded. Two teams will play in the open category and two teams will play in the women’s section. Five-time world champion Viswanathan Anand will mentor the Indian contingent. He has decided not to play in Olympiads to give a chance to the youth.
The main team for the Open category of the Olympiad will be Vidit Gujrathi, P Harikrishna, K Sasikiran, besides 19-year-olds Arjun Arigesi and SL Narayanan. Among them, R Pragnananda, Nihal Sarin, D Gukesh, Raunak Sadhwani, who recently defeated on-line rapid world champion Magnus Carlsen, will be part of the Olympiad for the first time.
In women’s team, Koneru Humpy, World No. 10 D Harika, Tania Sachdev, R Vaishali and Bhakti Kulkarni, Soumya Swaminathan, Mary Ann Gomes, Padmini Raut, Vantika Agarwal and 15-year-old Divya Deshmukh will participate.
