New chess trust invites UK Grandmaster
Calistus Kolantsho | Friday July 28, 2017 14:42
Short will be in Botswana from September 5 to 11.
The Trust coordinator, Kenneth Boikhutshwane said there is always talk that there is need to produce local grand and international masters. He said it is difficult for someone to teach one on how to become a grand master when they are not a grand master and all they can teach is theory. He said it is critical to bring in someone like Short who can train young players and identify the right talent.
“He can advise on the curriculum to see if players are taught the right things. GM Short has pushed Iran and they now have many Grand Masters,” he said.
Boikhutshwane said Short’s visit is part of the Talking Squares Grand Masters 10 year programme. He said Short is going to play with 50 players in a simultaneous session, with 25 players per session.
He said from the session, GM Short would be able to gauge the state of chess in the country. “We are going to have a qualification tournament next month, open to all players across the country and if you make it to the top 40, you go through. The remaining 10 would be wild cards,” Boikhutshwane said.
Short is the first high profile player to visit Botswana in a long time.
Boikhutshwane said he started the chess trust after the realisation that the leadership of Botswana Chess Federation (BCF) might not have the business acumen or strong knowledge of chess since it is put in office through elections. He said even clubs and other stakeholders might not have other skills of developing and training. He said that influenced him to set up the Trust due to his chess knowledge and business background.
“I wanted an organisation that I can use to source sponsorships and utilise my network to bring best players and trainers to Botswana and assist our players,” he said.
Short’s brief profile:
He was born in June 1, 1965. He is an English chess Grandmaster, chess columnist, chess coach and chess commentator. He earned the Grandmaster title when he was 19 years old and was ranked third in the World by FIDE from January 1988 to July 1989. In 1993, he became the first English player to play a World Chess Championship match, when he qualified to play Garry Kasparov in the World Chess Championship 1993 in London (Kasparov won, 12.5 to 7.5). As of March 2017, he is the oldest player ranked among FIDE’s top 100 players and is ranked number 55.
Short’s main highlights are; team silver medals in the chess Olympiads of Thessaloniki 1984, Dubai 1986 (where he also took gold medal for the best individual performance on board three) and Thessaloniki 1988. He took a team bronze in the Novi Sad Olympiad of 1990, and led England to fourth-place finishes in both 1994 and 1996. He led the English team to victory in the 1997 Euroteams at Pula, and was a member of the bronze winning team in 1992, and of fourth place teams in 1983 and 2001. He was a member of three English teams in the World Team Chess Championships of 1985 (team bronze), 1989 (team bronze), and 1997 (team fourth).
(Source Wikipedia)