Chess Olympiad: Erigaisi, Gukesh, Pragg lead mighty Indian challenge

Is 2024 going to be the watershed year for Indian chess?

Before Gukesh D. goes to match wits against reigning world champion Ding Liren of China for the FIDE world title in Singapore in November–December, the Chess Olympiad in Budapest sees an assembly of names with enough firepower to win India's first-ever gold.    

Here’s a look at the team assembled for the showpiece of September 11–22:

• Arjun Erigaisi: world No.4 at 21 years, Elo rating of 2778

• Gukesh D.: No.7 at 18 years, 2764

• R. Praggnanandhaa (popularly 'Pragg'): No.12 at 19 years, 2750

• Vidit Gujrathi: No.24 at 29 years; 2720

• and senior pro P. Harikrishna: No.41 at 38 years, 2686

• There is clearly a problem of plenty as to who will play in which board, but captain Srinath Narayanan will certainly not mind it.

But who will play which board? That is clearly a problem of plenty, one that captain Srinath Narayanan certainly will not mind. 

Speaking to the Indian Express, Srinath said: “This is certainly the strongest team India has ever sent to an Olympiad. They have a pretty decent chance of winning the gold and a fair chance of winning a medal. Although this is the same team that India sent to the 2023 Asian Games [where they won silver], I think everyone has certainly become stronger in the last one year.”

There will be no Viswanathan Anand, the five-time FIDE world champion who is currently ranked 11th in the world, despite him not being that active on the circuit any more — but he is always on hand for a word of advice.

An Indian team has won gold at the Olympiad in the past, sure — but that was a shared ranking with Russia, at the 2020 online Chess Olympiad during the Covid-1 pandemic.

India also has bronze medals from their campaigns of 2014 and 2022.

Gukesh's rising graph

The last edition of the Olympiad, the 2022 one in Chennai, saw Gukesh shoot into the limelight, but a lot of water has flowed under the bridge since — culminating in an unprecedented five players (including two women) qualifying for the Candidates event in Toronto in April.

Gukesh stunned the field to emerge the champion in Canada — earning a shot at becoming the youngest world champion of the board of 64 squares.

“Even if Gukesh does become world champion later this year, an Olympiad gold medal for India is a very special feeling,” said Srinath. “Everyone’s really highly motivated for this. You can feel it in the way the players have prepared. It means a lot to them. They’re as motivated as they can be [to win the gold].”

India vs Others

The Indian men’s team (including the reserve player) has a rating average of 2739, which makes them one of only three teams at the Olympiad to have an average rating over 2700, the other two being the US and China.

While China has Ding Liren playing for them, the US is slightly weakened by Hikaru Nakamura not playing. Magnus Carlsen, another five-time world champion, will lead Norway.

The US team is the top seed in the men’s category, followed by India and China in second and third places, respectively.

Georgia narrowly leads India in the women’s seedings, with China missing their top four players.

Asked how players train for to make a national team in a largely individualistic sport, Srinath said there was no camp like the one held under the supervision of Boris Gelfand in Kolkata ahead of the Hangzhou Asian Games last year.

“We didn’t have a training camp because more than half the players were playing in events right up to the end, but we would have joint calls online. We’ll just figure out how to bond with each other and spend time with each other in Budapest, maybe team dinners or gym sessions if players prefer that,” Srinath added.

Grandmaster Abhijit Kunte will act as the non-playing captain of the India women’s team, comprised of newly minted grandmaster R. Vaishali, reigning junior world champion Divya Deshmukh, Vantika Agrawal and Tania Sachdev.