Kramnik tops in Fide ratings

I have just been looking at the latest Fide rating list which was released by the World Chess Federation late last month and the first thing that struck me was that the K's of chess are still dominating the world rankings.

But surprise, surprise! It is neither Gary Kasparov nor Anatoly Karpov who are at the top of the heap. It is also not Gata Kamsky, who is scheduled to play a world championship match with Karpov later in the year.

Instead, the top honours belong to 20-year-old Vladimir Kramnik who has a rating of 2775, an increase of 45 points over last year's July rating list.

Actually, Kramnik and Kasparov have the same rating points but Kramnik's rating was calculated over 42 games whereas Kasparov's came from only 19 games.

Obviously, Fide had placed Kramnik higher than Kasparov because of the greater number of games that the former had played. This is the same criterion used by Fide throughout the list to rank players with the same rating points. The more active player is always ranked higher.

Kasparov's rating dipped to 2775 from last July's 2795. Karpov is in third position with 2770 as his rating, down from 2775 six months ago.

Also in this list, there are five other players with ratings of at least 2700. Two players - Vassily Ivanchuk and Kamsky - are rated at 2735, Viswanathan Anand is next at 2725, and both Veselin Topalov and Boris Gelfand are at 2700. The 20-year-old Topalov from Bulgaria had the biggest increase in rating points, up from 2640 in July 1995.

Below this elite group are 57 players with ratings of at least 2600. Some of the more prominent names in the 2600-2695 group are Alexei Shirov 2690, Judit Polgar 2675, Valery Salov 2670, Nigel Short 2665 and Viktor Korchnoi 2645.

Judit Polgar holds a record of sorts. Not only is she within the top 10 players in the world, but she is also ranked first among the top 20 junior players. Judit is also the highest ranked in the Fide women's rating list.

The reigning world champion, Xie Jun, is only ranked third, at 2530, among the women. She is behind Judit's eldest sister, Zsuzsa Polgar, who has a 2550 rating. And both Xie and Zsuzsa are going to play for the women's world championship title soon.

Among the highly rated women is Pia Cramling of Sweden. Cramling, with a rating of 2525, has always been among the top women players. Like Judit, Cramling used to play in open tournaments against male opposition in the early part of her chess career and this had benefited her game a lot.

Maya Chiburdanidze and Nona Gaprindashvili, two former women's world champions, are rated at 2515 and 2380. These six are the only women players ever awarded the men's grandmaster (GM) title by the World Chess Federation. The strength of the woman's grandmaster title (WGM) is perhaps equivalent to only that of the men's international master title.

Among the juniors, Zoltan Almasi (2650) is next in line after Judit Polgar and he is followed by Peter Svidler (2630). Both Peter Leko and Alexander Morozevich are rated at 2625 each. Vietnam's Dao Thien Hai is ranked eighth in the junior list with a 2560 rating.

Malaysians also feature in the rating list but our players are still a long way down the pecking order. Peter Long (2350) and Jimmy Liew (2335) remain our highest rated players although both have not appeared in an international tournament for a long time.

Below them, we have the current national champion, Mas Hafizul, who is rated at 2290 and after that is another inactive player, Eric Cheah, at 2255.

The rest of the Malaysians in the Fide list are: Mohd Fadli Zakaria (2250), Lim Yee Weng (2240), Mok Tze Meng (2240), Goh Yoon Wah (2230), Mohd Fairin Zakaria (2220), Mohd Irman Ibrahim (2220), Ng Ee Vern (2220), Ooi Chern Ee (2220), Mohd Kamal Abdullah (2205), Ng Ek Teong (2200), Sabar Md Hashim (2195), Yeoh Chin Seng (2195), Ahmad Muzzafar (2185), Mohd Saprin Sabri (2150), Tan Hong Ghee (2150), Wong Zi Jing (2130), Azahari Md Nor (2110), Thomas Lam (2105), Julian Navaratnam (2090), Ismail Ahmad (2070), Lim Tse Pin (2070), Audrey Wong (2070), Eliza Hanim Ibrahim (2050), Eliza Hanum Ibrahim (2050), Nurul Huda Wahiduddin (2040) and Mohan Raj (2025).

ST JOHN'S TEAM TOURNAMENT

The St John's Institution in Kuala Lumpur will organise its seventh annual team championship on Feb 3 and 4. This event is open to all school teams in Kuala Lumpur and Selangor, and will be played according to Rapid-30 chess rules.

Each team shall comprise five players, inclusive of a reserve. Students presently waiting for their examination results are allowed to turn out for their schools but they must be in their school uniforms.

Teams interested in taking part in this event, sponsored by Pure products, can register at the SJI by 8.30am on March 25. Entry fee is RM25 per team and trophies will be awarded to the best five teams. The best girl team shall also receive a trophy.

For more information, contact Lim Teik Hun or Wong Nai Chien.

WEEKEND CHESS

The Sek Ren Jenis Kebangsaan (China) Kepong in Kuala Lumpur will be the venue for a one-day junior open tournament this Sunday.

This event, organised by Total Chess, is divided into three sections - under-10, under-12 and under-16 - and prizes will be given away for each section.

The six-round event starts at 9.30am and participants are required to register either with Joseph Toh of Total Chess (tel: 03-757-4606) or be at the school by 9am on the tournament day. Entry fee is RM6 for students of the school and RM9 for others.

 

A Chinese chess lesson

It is not often that one gets to watch both international and Chinese chess together. Thus when the Penang Gerakan Youth held a chess competition recently, it was a real treat to see the two types of chess under one roof.

I shall not say much about the 70-player international chess section except to mention the top winners. Three players - Chuah Heng Meng, Lim Chuin Hoong and Teng Wei Hong - each tied with six points from seven games.

The tie was broken using the Cumulative method and Chuah was declared the winner of the first prize. Lim was second and Teng third.

The same tie-breaking method was used to determine that Tan Kwang Yi was fourth, ahead of fifth-placed Teng Wei Ping and sixth-placed Lim Cheong Wan. These three players had secured 5 1/2 points each.

Now about the Chinese chess section of this tournament. Despite the fact that Chinese chess features very little in my life, having been brought up on a steady diet of international chess, it is not totally unknown to me. I know for a fact that quite some time ago, Chinese chess competitions were normally run according to the double knockout system. The players that were knocked out along the way were given a second chance to play in the losers' pool and the eventual winners of the winners' and losers' pools would then play to decide the overall champion.

This system was not too sophisticated in trying to overcome the demerits of knockout tournaments, but it was one which seemed best in the circumstances at that time.

But not any more. The structure of Chinese chess competitions has changed. They are now run according to the Swiss pairing rules and some Chinese chess organisers even use a computerised pairing programme when running their events. I have even seen a booklet written in Chinese on the technical aspects of a chess rating system.

In these areas, Chinese chess owes much to the world of international chess. The World Chess Federation (Fide) should, I suppose, feel flattered that their pairing and rating rules are now adapted for Chinese chess competitions and administration.

But while there is a lot that Chinese chess has benefited from international chess, I would like to think that in return, international chess can perhaps learn one or two things from Chinese chess.

Earlier, I mentioned the use of the Cumulative tie-breaking method for the international chess section of the Penang Gerakan Youth tournament. Presently, this is the tie-break adopted by Fide.

But it was not so long ago that the Solkoff was the first choice among the tie-breaking methods and before that, it was the cumbersome Sonnenborn-Berger tie-break. The latter is hardly ever used nowadays but the Solkoff still is popular among many clubs worldwide.

In some Chinese chess competitions, I was told that the tie-breaking method is not specified at the start of a tournament, unlike in international chess. Instead, the tie-breaker is only chosen at the end of the event by the drawing of lots.

It is felt that the uncertainty over the tie-break will force the participants to play uncompromisingly throughout the competition and this will lead to less incidents of players planning their results. I think this idea is worth looking into further.

But a second idea from the Chinese chess section of this tournament failed to impress me although it led to an amusing situation during one of the games.

What happened was that in any apparently drawn position, one player can always decline the prospect of a draw and instead, try for a win. If he signals this intention to the arbiter, the player is given five minutes on his chess clock to demonstrate that he can indeed win.

It is well and good if the player does win, but if he cannot do so after five minutes, his opponent can then claim the full point himself. This is a controversial and fascinating idea but in Penang, it led to a big argument between the players with the arbiter caught inbetween. Sparks really flew.

This type of regulation, I should think, will certainly not go down well with the Fide Rules Commission. I would not even think it should be introduced in our local international chess tournaments.

JOHOR OPEN

The Johor Chess Club will stage the Johor Open chess championship this Sunday at the Pelangi Leisure Mall in Jalan Serampang, Taman Pelangi, Johor Bahru.

The championship features three sections - open, under-16 and under-12. Separate prizes will be given to the men and women in each section.

The men's open section offers a top prize of RM1,000 and for the runners-up, RM700. There are 13 other prizes totalling RM1,650. For the other sections in this tournament, the collective prize fund is RM1,495.

Entry fees for the open section are RM30 for the men and RM15 for the women. For the under-16 and under-12, the fee is RM8 per player.

Games start at 9am on Sunday but participants must report to the tournament hall by 8am. Those interested should contact Sumathy or Stephen Cheong for entry forms.

 

New FIDE moves on

At about the same time that I was watching the Asian team chess championship last month, the Presidential Board of the World Chess Federation (FIDE) was holding its first meeting in Singapore since the end of the last Paris General Assembly.

The focus was, of course, on the 33-year-old Kirsan Ilyumjinov who was making his first tour of duty in the Far East as the new FIDE president.

From Singapore, the FIDE president later flew to Kuala Lumpur where he met with the Malaysian Chess Federation president, Dato Sabbaruddin Chik, and from here, he left for Manila where he was a guest of the former FIDE president, Florencio Campomanes.

Ilyumjinov is also the president of the Kalmykia Republic which is an autonomous region within the Russian Federation.

(For thoseof you who need to know, Kalmykia, according to my trusty world atlas, fronts the Caspian Sea. Its capital is Elista and it is not too far away from the troubled Chechnya republic where a civil war has been raging for years.)

What I gathered from people who attended the FIDE presidential board meeting, Ilyumjinov took control of the proceedings from the very start and was very decisive in steering the meeting towards its conclusion.

The end of the meeting coincided with the last round of the Asian team championship and the FIDE presidential board found the time to attend the closing ceremony.

There, Ilyumjinov spoke for a while in his halting but passable English. Boy, did he deliver some shocking news to the people assembled at the ceremony!

Firstly, he spoke about re-creating a favourable image for chess after all the adverse publicity in the past. "To get investments, we have to show stability and existence," he said.

Thus, he had set up a marketing team in Moscow to find the best ways to promote FIDE and chess around the world, and to this end, a 15-second video clip was made for showing on prime time over CNN and Russian TV. This promotion alone personally costed him US$400,000 (about RM1.02 million).

Secondly, Ilyumjinov spoke about his efforts in trying to find a way to reunite the two world championship titles now presently held by Anatoly Karpov and Gary Kasparov.

He stressed that FIDE's role was to promote chess and the federation should be above all other chess organisations. The Professional Chess Association (PCA) was not mentioned specifically but it was clear from Ilyumjinov's message that he considers FIDE still wielding the ultimate control in the chess world.

He proposed the creation of an annual world championship tournament to replace the traditional series of matches that are organised in a three-year cycle. For the first such tournament beginning Dec 22 this year, the prize fund is proposed at US$5 million (about RM12.75 million).

During the three weeks of the tournament, a series of short knockout matches involving the world's top 100 players will be held. Eight rounds will be played.

The first round would have 68 players made up of the FIDE zonal qualifiers, the PCA Grand Prix qualifiers and players from the host federation. Some players will qualify directly into the second round and some others to the third round. Kasparov and the winner of the Kamsky-Karpov match would be seeded directly into the semi-finals but they would be paired together only if they reached the final.

This new idea, unanimously accepted by the Presidential Board, effectively meant that the forthcoming Interzonal tournament in Erevan this April would be cancelled.

Ilyumjinov also disclosed that before arriving in Singapore, he was in Budapest to meet the former American world champion, Bobby Fischer.

He said he would be paying Fischer the US$100,000 (RM255,000) which the American is claiming from the former Soviet Chess Federation. For many years now, Fischer has been insisting that the former Soviets pay him royalties for the illegal Russian translation of his best-selling book, My 60 Memorable Games.

After 12 hours of talk, Ilyumjinov reported that he managed to extract a promise from Fischer to reconsider his position with FIDE. The American had also accepted from the FIDE president a gift of land to build a house in Kalmykia.

GAMES OF THE WEEK

This week, the focus is still on the Asian team chess championship where I have been able to obtain several interesting games. Some of them feature our local boys.

Mas Hafizulhelmi - Dao Thien Hai (Vietnam)

1. e4 c5, 2. Nf3 d6, 3. d4 cxd4, 4. Nxd4 Nf6, 5. Nc3 a6, 6. f4 Qc7, 7. Be2 e5, 8. Nf3 Be7, 9. O-O O-O,, 10. a4 Nbd7, 11. Kh1 Re8, 12. a5 Nc5, 13. Nd5 Nxd5, 14. exd5 Bf6, 15. fxe5 dxe5, 16. Be3 e4, 17. Nd4 Be5, 18. h3 Qd8, 19. Nf5 Bxf5, 20. Rxf5 Rc8, 21. Ra2 Bb8, 22. b4 Nd7, 23. c4 g6, 24. Rf1 Be5, 25. c5 Qh4, 26. d6 Rf8, 27. Qd5 Rce8, 28. Bc4 Nf6, 29. Qd2 Nh5, 30. Qf2 Qg3, 31. Qg1 Qh4, 32. Qf2 Qg3, 33. Qg1 Kg7, 34. Bd4 e3, 35. Rf3 Bxd4, 36. Rxg3 Nxg3+ 37. Kh2 Be5, 38. Qe1 e2, 39. Ra3 h5, 40. h4 Bf4, 41. Rd3 Re5, 42. Bd5 Nf5+, 43. Kh3 Rfe8, 44. d7 Rd8, 45. Bxb7 Rxd7, 46. Rxd7 Bg3, 47. Qxe2 Rxe2, 48. Bd5 Re1, 49. Rxf7+ Kh6, 50. Rxf5 Bb8 0-1

Nguyen Anh Dung (Vietnam) - Ooi Chern Ee

1. d4 Nf6, 2. c4 e6, 3. Nf3 Bb4+, 4. Bd2 Qe7, 5. e3 Nc6, 6. Nc3 Bxc3, 7. Bxc3 Ne4, 8. Rc1 Nb4, 9. Qb3 a5, 10. a3 Nxc3, 11. axb4 Ne4, 12. Ra1 b6, 13. Bd3 Bb7, 14. bxa5 Ng5, 15. Ke2 Nxf3, 16. axb6 Nxd4+, 17. exd4 cxb6, 18. Qxb6 Bxg2, 19. Rxa8+ Bxa8, 20. Qb8+ Qd8, 21. Qxd8+ Kxd8, 22. Ra1 Bb7, 23. b4 g5, 24. c5 Kc7, 25. b5 Kb8, 26. Kd2 f5, 27. Bc4 Rf8, 28. Rb1 Be4, 29. Bd3 Bd5, 30. b6 h5, 31. Bb5 Rf7, 32. Rc1 f4, 33. c6 dxc6, 34. Bxc6 g4, 35. Bxd5 exd5, 36. Rc5 Rf5, 37. Rc7 Rf6, 38. Rh7 Rxb6, 39. Rxh5 Rb2+, 40. Ke1 Rb1+, 41. Ke2 Rb2+ 1/2-1/2

Hsu Li Yang (Singapore) - Lin Weiguo (China)

1. d4 Nf6, 2. c4 g6, 3. g3 Bg7, 4. Bg2 d5, 5. cxd5 Nxd5, 6. e4 Nb6, 7. Ne2 O-O, 8. Nbc3 e5, 9. d5 c6, 10. O-O cxd5, 11. exd5 Na6, 12. a4 Bg4, 13. a5 Nc4, 14. h3 Bxe2, 15. Qxe2 Nd6, 16. Be3 Qd7, 17. Kh2 f5, 18. f4 Rfe8, 19. fxe5 Bxe5, 20. Qf2 Bxc3, 21. bxc3 Ne4, 22. Qf4 Rac8, 23. Bd4 Nac5, 24. g4 fxg4, 25. hxg4 Nd3, 26. Qh6 Nxc3, 27. Rf6 Ne5, 28. Bxe5 Rxe5, 29. Raf1 Qg7, 30. Qf4 Re7, 31. d6 Rd7, 32. g5 Kh8, 33. Bh3 Nd5, 34. Qe5 Nxf6, 35. gxf6 1-0

Cerdas Barus (Indonesia) - Nelson Mariano (Philippines)

1. d4 Nf6, 2. c4 g6, 3. Nc3 Bg7, 4. e4 d6, 5. Be2 O-O, 6. Nf3 e5, 7. Be3 Ng4, 8. Bg5 f6, 9. Bh4 c6, 10. d5 Kh8, 11. Nd2 Nh6, 12. a3 g5, 13. Bg3 f5, 14. exf5 Nxf5, 15. Nde4 Nd4, 16. Bd3 Bf5, 17. O-O Na6, 18. Re1 cxd5, 19. Nxd5 Rc8, 20. Rc1 Bg6, 21. b4 Nc7, 22. Nxc7 Rxc7, 23. h3 b6, 24. Nc3 Nf5, 25. Bh2 Rcf7, 26. Be4 Qf6, 27. Bd5 Rc7, 28. Ne4 Qe7, 29. Rc3 Nd4, 30. Rd3 Bxe4, 31. Rxe4 Qf6, 32. Bg3 Qg6, 33. f3 Rfc8, 34. Qa4 g4, 35. hxg4 b5, 36. cxb5 Ne2+, 37. Kf2 Rc2, 38. b6 Nf4+, 39. Rd2 Rxd2+, 40. Ke1 axb6, 41. Kxd2 Nxd5, 42. Qd7 Qe8, 43. Qxe8+ Rxe8, 44. Rc4 Ra8, 45. Bh4 Bf8, 46. g3 b5, 47. Re4 Rxa3, 48. f4 Bg7, 49. Re1 Kg8, 50. f5 h6, 51. Bd8 e4 0-1

Wang Zili (China) - Sergey Zagrebelny (Uzbekistan)

1. e4 c5, 2. Nf3 d6, 3. d4 cxd4, 4. Nxd4 Nf6, 5. Nc3 a6, 6. Be3 e5, 7. Nb3 Be6, 8. f3 Be7, 9. Qd2 O-O, 10. O-O-O b5, 11. g4 b4, 12. Nd5 Bxd5, 13. exd5 a5, 14. Kb1 Qc7, 15. g5 Nh5, 16. Bh3 a4, 17. Nc1 Na6, 18. Nd3 f5, 19. Nxe5 a3, 20. Nc6 axb2, 21. f4 g6, 22. Rhe1 Rfe8, 23. Bf1 Bf8, 24. Bc4 Re4, 25. Bd3 Ree8, 26. Bc4 Re4, 27. Bxa6 Rxa6, 28. Bd4 Ra8, 29. Rxe4 fxe4, 30. Bxb2 Re8, 31. Qe3 Qf7, 32. Bc1 Ng7, 33. Qb3 Nf5, 34. Nd4 Nxd4, 35. Rxd4 Bg7, 36. Rxb4 Qa7, 37. Be3 Qa6, 38. Qc4 Qa3, 39. Qb3 Qa6, 40. Rb5 Qc8, 41. a4 Qh3, 42. Rb8 Rxb8, 43. Qxb8+ Kf7, 44. Qb6 Qf1+, 45. Bc1 Qc4, 46. Qb5 Qd4, 47. Qd7+ Kf8, 48. Qxd6+ Ke8, 49. Qc6+ Kd8, 50. c3 Qd3+, 51. Kb2 Bf8, 52. Qa8+ Ke7, 53. Qb7+ Kd8, 54. Qb8+ Ke7, 55. Qb5 Qf3, 56. d6+ 1-0

Alexander Nenashev (Uzbekistan) - Xu Jun (China)

1. d4 Nf6, 2. c4 e6, 3. Nf3 Bb4+, 4. Nbd2 b6, 5. e3 Bb7, 6. Bd3 O-O, 7. O-O d5, 8. b3 Nbd7, 9. Bb2 c5, 10. cxd5 Nxd5, 11. a3 Bxd2, 12. Qxd2 N5f6, 13. Rfd1 Qe7, 14. Qe2 cxd4, 15. Nxd4 e5, 16. Nf5 Qe6, 17. e4 Rfc8, 18. Bb5 Rc7, 19. Nd6 Rf8, 20. Bc4 Qe7, 21. Rac1 Nc5, 22. f3 Nh5, 23. Nf5 Qf6, 24. Rd6 Nf4, 25. Qf1 Nce6, 26. Bxe6 Rxc1, 27. Bxf7+ Qxf7, 28. Bxc1 Qxb3, 29. Bxf4 exf4, 30. Qa1 Qf7, 31. Re6 Bc8, 32. Re7 Qf6, 33. Qxf6 gxf6, 34. Nh6+ Kh8, 35. Rxa7 Be6, 36. Rb7 Rc8, 37. Rxb6 Rc1+, 38. Kf2 Bc4, 39. g4 Rc2+, 40. Ke1 Re2+, 41. Kd1 Rxh2, 42. Rb8+ Kg7, 43. Nf5+ Kg6, 44. Rb6 Bf7, 45. Kc1 h5, 46. gxh5+ Rxh5, 47. a4 Rh1+, 48. Kb2 Rh2+, 49. Kc3 Ra2, 50. Rb7 Be6, 51. Nd4 Bh3, 52. Kb3 Rd2, 53. Kc4 Kg5, 54. Rg7+ Kh4, 55. a5 Ra2, 56. Kb4 Rb2+, 57. Kc5 Ra2, 58. Kb6 Rb2+, 59. Kc7 Ra2, 60. Nc6 Ra3, 61. Rg6 Rxf3, 62. a6 Ra3, 63. a7 f3, 64. Rxf6 Kg3, 65. Kb6 Rb3+, 66. Kc5 Ra3, 67. Kb4 Ra6, 68. Nd4 Rxa7, 69. Rxf3+ Kh4, 70. Kc5 Bg4, 71. Rf8 Kg5, 72. Nc6 Ra1, 73. Kd5 Ra6, 74. e5 Ra1, 75. Nd4 1/2-1/2

 

Philippines the champ, Teenage power

Well, I have just returned from my annual year-end holiday sojourn to Singapore and I must say that this year's trip had an added attraction.

The 11th Asian team chess championship was going on at the National University of Singapore and I had the opportunity to renew my acquaintances with some old chess friends and make new ones.

Let me tell you how thrilling this year's championship turned out to be. Kazakhstan, the defending champion, got off to a flying start and they led the field of 20 teams for the first five rounds.

The Kazakhs, however, allowed the Philippines to catch up with them in the sixth round and after that, well, the Kazakhstan challenge just fizzled out.

It was strange, but I believe the Kazakhs were playing more cohesively and steadily as a team when their number one player, grandmaster Vladislav Tkachiev, was not fielded.

Unlike two years ago in Kuala Lumpur when Tkachiev played round after round and doggedly scored point after point, here in Singapore he played only four games and could win only one. The other three games were drawn.

By the crucial seventh round, Kazakhstan had dissipated all their early advantages when they fell to Uzbekistan by a big margin. But the Filipinos also lost, to the Chinese, so the leaders after this round were: Uzbekistan 19 points, China 18 1/2 points, Indonesia 18 points and both Kazakhstan and Philippines 17 1/2 points each.

In the eighth round, Uzbekistan and Indonesia played to a draw while China, Kazakhstan and the Philippines all won their matches. The Filipinos had the biggest score, beating Iran 4-0, and so as the championship went into the final round, the Philippines found themselves leading for the very first time.

But it was a very slim lead. Both Uzbekistan and China were only a half point behind, with 21 points each, while Kazakhstan had 20 1/2 points and Indonesia 20 points. A tight finish was in store for the final round.

The Philippines were paired against the United Arab Emirates while Uzbekistan were to play New Zealand. Meanwhile, China faced the daunting task of facing Indonesia while Kazakhstan was paired with Singapore.

The UAE and the New Zealanders were not expected to provide much resistance, so the Filipinos and the Uzbeks were expected to score nothing less than 4-0 victories. If this had happened, the Philippines would be comfortable winners of the Tun Abdul Razak challenge trophy.

But it did not happen this way; both these teams conceded a drawn game each, so they were restricted to only 3 1/2-1/2 wins.

Normally, this would be sufficient for the Philippines to win the trophy but China confounded everybody by whitewashing the Indonesians in all their four games. So we had the Chinese team finishing the championship with the same points as the Philippines.

Who would be the new champion then: China or the Philippines? The tie-break would decide and as it turned out, it was the Kazakhstan match with Singapore that would provide the answer.

For China to be the champion, Kazakhstan would have to take at least three points from Singapore; otherwise, the Philippines would earn the trophy. When three games in the Kazakhstan-Singapore match ended, Kazakhstan had scored two wins to Singapore's one.

It was thus the crucial final game between Tkachiev and Singaporean international master Dr Wong Meng Kong that would decide the fate of the trophy. The Kazakh player tried his hardest to win but his opponent put up a dour defence to steer the game into a draw.

Thus, Kazakhstan could only win by 2 1/2 points and by virtue of this result, the Philippines became the new winner of the Asian team championship.

Kudos to the Philippines. In the 1970s, they were probably the strongest chess-playing country in east Asia but the last time that they won the trophy was in 1986. Thereafter, they were eclipsed first by China and later by Kazakhstan when the former Soviet republics joined the Asian chess fold.

In Singapore, the Filipinos were without their grandmaster Eugene Torre but another of their grandmasters, Rogelio Antonio, was a capable replacement on first board while international master Rogelio Barcenilla was deadly on third board. International masters Nelson Mariano and Ricky de Guzman played regularly on second and third boards, while Barlo Nadera and Ricardo Nolte propped up the team as reserve players.

Malaysia

The Malaysian team finished joint 12th to 15th in the championship. Ours was almost a totally teenaged team comprising national champion Mas Hafizulhelmi on first board, Ooi Chern Ee on second board, Tan Wei Sin on fourth board, Lim Yee Weng as first reserve and Abdul Haq Mohamad as second reserve. Our third board player, Julian Navaratnam, seemed oddly out of place among this array of Malaysian "power rangers".

Mas Hafizul was a little out of his depth playing on the first board. He had three consecutive losses followed by two draws before winning against Singapore's Dr Wong Meng Kong and then he lost a fourth time. On second board, Ooi fared better with five wins, two draws and two losses.

Julian scored a win, a draw and three losses; Tan had two wins, two draws and three losses; Lim obtained three wins and two losses; and Abdul Haq won one and lost two.

Women's game

For the first time since the inception of the Asian team championship in 1974, a women's section was introduced by the Singapore Chess Federation. It was very encouraging to see 12 teams taking part.

China was led by their women's world champion, Xie Jun, and it was a foregone conclusion that the Chinese team would be the first winner of the Far East challenge trophy.

They led from the word "go" and even a slight hiccup against Kazakhstan in the fourth round (the Kazakh women won 2-1) could not prevent Xie Jun and company from claiming that trophy.

Theirs was such a comfortable lead that against Indonesia, Malaysia and Iran in the middle stretch of the championship, they could afford to drop half points against these teams. But towards the end, the Chinese again turned on their full power to annihilate the opposition.

During the championship, there was a general feeling that Xie, a full-fledged grandmaster, was not playing to her full strength. Who knows, perhaps she was afraid to disclose her preparations for her forthcoming defence of the world championship title against Hungary's Zsuzsa Polgar.

She only played five games out of nine rounds but her contribution was four points towards the Chinese team's total of 23. But even without Xie, the other Chinese players, comprising two woman grandmasters and a woman international master, were formidable enough.

Again, Malaysia put up a women's team and the pleasant surprise was that we were not outclassed in this field. The Malaysians may have lost four matches but they also won four matches and drawing one.

Khairunissa Wahiduddin, the current national women's champion, was in good form to score five wins and two draws. She lost only one game. Eliza Hanum Ibrahim obtained four wins and four draws; Roslina Marmono had four wins, two draws and two losses, while Norfatitah Saranon lost all her three games.

Final standings (Men): Philippines, China 25 points; Uzbekistan 24 1/2; Kazakhstan 23; Mongolia 22; Vietnam 21; Indonesia 20; Iran 19 1/2; Singapore A, UAE 19; Singapore B 18; Japan, New Zealand, Malaysia, Hongkong 16 1/2; Qatar 16; Sri Lanka 15; Asean 13 1/2; Macau 8; and Brunei 5 1/2.

(Women): China 23 points; Vietnam 19 1/2; Kazakhstan 18 1/2; Indonesia 18; Uzbekistan 17; Malaysia 15; Iran 13 1/2; Sri Lanka 11 1/2; UAE 8 1/2; Singapore A 7; Singapore B 4; and Singapore C 3 1/2.

JOHOR OPEN

The Johor Chess Club will organise the Johor open chess championship on Jan 21 at the Pelangi Leisure Mall in Jalan Serampang, Taman Pelangi, Johor Bahru.

This is a one-day Swiss event run according to the World Chess Federation's Rapid Chess rules.

There will be three sections - an open, an under-16 and an under-12 - and for the men's and women's sections, and separate prizes will be given to the men and women.

The men's open section offers a top prize of RM1,000 and for the runners-up, RM700. There are 13 other prizes in this section with a total prize fund of RM1,650. For the other sections in this tournament, the collective prize fund is RM1,495.

Entry fees for the open section are RM30 for the men and RM15 for the women. However, special discounts are given if you are among the first 50 players to register for the tournament. In this instance, the men need pay only RM20 and the women RM10.

Entry fees for the under-16 and under-12 sections are RM8 per player. There is also a discounted fee of RM5 for the first 50 players in each section.

Games start at 9am on Jan 21 but the organisers require the participants to report to the tournament hall by 8am.

Those interested should contact either Sumathy or Stephen Cheong for the entry forms.

Closing date for entries is Jan 16.