Asian Games: China’s Liren starts favourite

Quarterfinalists at the recently-concluded FIDE World Cup in Baku, India’s Vidit Santosh Gujarathi and Arjun Erigaisi will get into action in the men’s individual competition as chess returns to the Asian Games after a gap of 12 years at Hangzhou. Both Gujarathi and Erigaisi will represent the country in the nine-round rapid competition to be played in Swiss League format at the Hangzhou Qi-Yuan (Zhili) Chess Hall from Sunday (September 24). In the corresponding women’s individual competition, India will be represented by two of the country’s most experienced and accomplished women players — former World Rapid Champion Koneru Humpy and World championship medallist Dronavalli Harika. Humpy won the gold medal in women’s Individual Rapid in the 2006 event in Doha, Qatar. She was also part of the India team that won the Mixed Team competition. FIDE World Cup 2023 runner-up Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa and India’s highest-ranked player in classical chess, Dommaraju Gukesh, along with Vidit and Arjun will form the India men’s team that will participate in the men’s Team Competition. Seasoned Pentala Harikrishna is the fifth member of the Indian team. While India has put up strong contenders in all sections, it would not be an easy campaign for both men’s and women’s sections because host China has pulled out all the stops to put up very strong squads in all sections. Reigning men’s World Champion Ding Liren will be leading the Chinese challenge in the men’s individual championship while three-time World Champion Hou Yifan will spearhead China in the women’s individual and team competitions. Yifan won the individual gold and led the hosts to gold in the women’s team competition in 2010 at Guangzhou when chess was last played. Besides Ding Liren, Bu Xiangzhu, Xu Ziangyu, and Yi Wei will form the Chinese team for the Men’s team competition. On paper, the Indian men’s team looks a bit stronger than the Chinese considering t