Humpy, Harika eye diamond-studded crown

As Viswanathan Anand is the reigning World Champion, can we also boast of two World Champions at the same time?

The 21-year-old Humpy is the most decorated player in this event, both in terms of titles and records.

The second highest rated woman in the world after Judit Polgar, Humpy is 65 points ahead of the next highest rated player in the fray, Yifan Hou of China.

Humpy has been concentrating more on Open events but has strangely been struggling in women’s events. At the last edition, she had started as the top seed, but was eliminated in the second round.

This time a determined Humpy has been training and focusing entirely on this event. “I have been looking at some new aspects, basically trying to get into form. My side of the draw has Georgians and Chinese who are the strongest players and I have been preparing specifically,” said Humpy.

A pregnant Yuhua had emerged as the winner in the previous edition in 2006, but may find it difficult to recapture her top form after a long lay off.

Antoaneta Stefonova of Bulgaria is the fifth seed, but could turn out to be the toughest challenger for Humpy. The 29-year-old Stefanova has been competing in both Open as well as women’s events and apart from chess skills is also mentally very tough.

As recently as last month, she won the North Urals’ Cup, which was touted as the toughest ever women’s event with effortless ease. She defeated Humpy in the very first round then.

The other player to watch out for is Chinese sensation, 14-year-old Yifan Hou, whose whirlwind climb to fourth position in the women rankings has caught everyone's attention.

In 2006, she had reached the third round of this event and she has gone from strength to strength since.

In fact, all the Chinese players would be tough to beat. China's aggressive approach to training has had them churning out World Champs since 1991, with just two exceptions - Susan Polgar from 1996 to 1999 and Stefanova from 2004 to 2006.

Russia, who had been dominating the women’s events, (mostly Georgians) will be banking on the glam girl of chess Alexandra Kosteniuk and the Kosintseva sisters, Tatiana and Nadehzda.

Kosteniuk had contested a world championship final in 2001, but had lost to Zhu Chen. She is another player who is returning to competitive chess after the birth of her daughter and may not be in the best of form.

Apart from Humpy, the other Indians vying for the title are Harika Dronavalli seeded 22nd, Tania Sachdev seeded 28th and Nisha Mohota seeded 42nd.

Nisha is the only player to be pitted against a higher-ranked player, while the other three are expected to cruise through.

Chess players are more accustomed to league events and the knock-out events have been throwing up surprising or rather shocking results. Favourites have faltered most of the times, more so because they have not been able to hold their nerve. There is no room for error in this format and the slightest mistake could leave you with no comeback opportunity. Chess skills have to be coupled skillfully with well-worked out strategy and most importantly the ability to stay calm with the clock ticking.

Also read:  Vishy Anand's memories of Chennai

This championship has been delayed and postponed, venues have been changed thrice and once again there are huge doubts surrounding the participation of many players, especially Georgians, who had decided to pull out. Players from US and Europe have also voiced their concern about the safety of the players taking into consideration the armed conflict between Russia and Georgia, countries in close proximity to the venue.

TOP TEN RATED PLAYERS

1 GM Yuhua Xu (Chn; 2483)
2 GM Koneru, Humpy (IND ;2622)
3 WGM Yifan Hou (CHN; 2557)
4 GM Antoaneta Stefanova (BUL; 2550)
5 GM Pia Cramling (SWE; 2544)
6 IM Marie Sebag (FRA; 2529)
7 IM Xue Zhao ( CHN; 2522)
8 IM Tatiana Kosintseva (RUS; 2511)
9 GM Alexandra Kosteniuk (RUS; 2510)
10 IM Viktoria Cmilyte (LTU; 2508)