Alisher Suleymenov, a chess grandmaster from Pavlodar won the match against Magnus Carlsen, a five-time world chess champion, during the Qatar Open, according to the Kazakhstan Chess Federation (Kazchess).
How was the match going? According to Kazchess, the Norwegian champion, who is ranked more than 300 notches ahead of the grandmaster from Kazakhstan, was looking down at him as he didn’t consider Suleymenov a strong opponent.
«Carlsen made a set of perfunctory moves in the middle of the game and was immediately punished. On the 31st move Carlsen stopped the clock due to imminent losses,» the federation said in a statement.
What was the champion’s reaction to his defeat? As Carlsen wrote in the social network Х (formerly known as Twitter), he felt oppressed and lost the game because of the watch the Kazakhstani grandmaster wears on his hand.
«I was completely crushed in my game today. This is not to accuse my opponent of anything, who played an amazing game and deserved to win, but honestly, as soon as I saw my opponent was wearing a watch early in the game, I lost my ability to concentrate,» Magnus wrote.
He also said that he’d asked the arbiter whether watches are allowed to be worn during the tournament and the arbiter explained that players aren’t allowed to wear smartwatches, only analog ones.
«It seems that this contradicts rules by FIDE designed for tournaments of such a level,» he wrote.
What was the reaction of Kazchess? President of the Kazakhstan Chess Federation Timur Turlov congratulated Alisher Suleymenov on the landslide victory.
«This is an incredible victory over the current champion for Alisher (No. 528 in the FIDE rating) from the psychological point of view but not the only one in this chess season. The grandmaster has shown the highest standards of the game recently and won the bronze medal in the Asian Chess Championship. I am very happy for Alisher and I am proud of his victory. This is a result of the support Kazchess has been offering to chess players in terms of routine training and when it comes to the participation in certain tournaments,» Turlov wrote.
What do we know about the tournament? The Qatar Masters Open is one of the most high-profile open tournaments in the world. Only those players who have ratings of 2,300 or more are eligible for participation in this contest. This year, the tournament has gathered 252 chess players including 60 grandmasters from 44 countries. The prize fund of the Qatar Masters Open is $108,250.
What tournaments have been recently conducted in Kazakhstan? Over the period from April 7 to May 1, the FIDE World Championship 2023 with a prize fund of $2 million was held in Astana. At the time, Yan Nepomnyashchy from Russia and Ding Liren from China grappled for the title.
As a result, Ding Liren became the 17th world chess champion and the first world champion in the history of China as he beat Nepomnyashchy in the fourth match-game of a tie-breaker. The general sponsor of the FIDE championship was Freedom Holding Corp.
In June, the Asian Continental Chess Championship with a prize fund of $100,000 was held in Almaty. During this tournament, Kazakhstanis won two gold and two bronze medals in blitz and classical chess.
In August, the country held the World Schools Team Championship, the first world tournament for children who attend chess classes and regular pupils.
Who is in charge of Kazchess? In January 2023, CEO of Freedom Holding Timur Turlov became the president of the Kazakhstan Chess Federation, while grandmaster Darmen Sadvokasov was appointed vice president of the organization. Moreover, in March 2023, Sadvokasov was also elected as vice president of the Asian Chess Federation (ACF), which has 54 member states including Kazakhstan and Russia. According to Sadvokasov, the fact that he was appointed to this position is a sign of international recognition of Kazakhstan’s success in the world of chess and the role of Kazchess in organizing tournaments on a worldwide scale.
