Koneru Humpy emphasized the need for more girls to play chess after the success at the 2022 Olympics
On the last day of the Chess Games at Mamallapuram, a woman in her 40s and wearing a kameez salwar shirt rushed to Koneru Humpy shortly after she finished the game. The female superstar of Indian chess drew her game on the headboard with Gulrukhbegim Tokhirjonova.
The woman wants to know how the rest of the Indian team is doing. She watched the matches from the spectator area.
“Are we going to win the gold?” she asked Humpy. “It can’t happen,” she replied.
It wasn’t a good day in the final game against the United States: both Tania Sachdev and Bhakti Kulkarni were in clearly poor positions.
The woman told her she was praying for an Indian victory. Prayers went unanswered, and Humpy’s team – India A – had to settle for bronze despite being the favorites, top seeds and hosts.
It’s great to see people willing to pay to watch chess matches. Usually in India you won’t find an audience even if the entry is free.
– Koneru Humpy has a huge turnout at the Chess Olympics
Humpy’s encounter with the unknown woman and the enthusiasm with which Chennai, and the rest of the country – fans flying down from different countries – responded to the Olympiad is a story in itself. Never before has chess in India impressed the audience so much.
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Humpy was pleasantly surprised when she said that the woman she met would probably pay Rs. 3,000 to buy a ticket to the Olympiad. “No, I didn’t know that,” she said. “It’s nice to see people willing to pay to watch chess matches. Usually in India you won’t find an audience even with free entry. “
She believes that the popularity of the game in the country will increase rapidly after the Olympiad. She hopes the historic bronze medal won by India will inspire more girls to join the game.
Indian female chess is in dire need of new talents. The lack of depth in the women’s game is one of the few things wrong with Indian chess at the moment.
If the women’s team still makes history – it was India’s first medal at the Olympiad – it is due to the intrinsic quality of the squad, which also includes Dronavalli Harika, R. Vaishali, Tania and Bhakti.
“We definitely need young girls to come through,” says Humpy, who has turned collecting World titles for age groups into a hobby.
“I am very pleased to see that Vaishali is showing a lot of progress. Girls like Divya Deshmukh (individual bronze winner for India 2) show a lot of promise. I also noticed that B. Savitha Shri has made great strides. But we need more like them. Just look at the number of world class young players in male Indian chess. “
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Looking back on her own performance at the Olympiad, she said she could have done better in the second half of the tournament. “Considering the fact that I am playing classical chess after a gap of two and a half years, I am not too displeased,” she said. “I know Harika depends a lot on me and I’m on the top boards. We missed Harika (he was heavily pregnant) in the last two innings.”
