The Qatar Chess Association gets away without sanction after abrupt cancellation of the Grand Prix event, FIDE President confirmed to the Russian "Sport-Express".
Rich sheiks might come handy.
Suleiman al-Fakhim, President of the UAE Chess federation and new owner of Manchester City Football Club, is promoted to CEO Commercial Affairs of FIDE.
Just as about everyone thought, back in March or April, that FIDE was coming up with a logical and long-term world championship cycle, Ilyumzhinov and company are starting to mess around again. Apparently, all this as a consequence of moving Grand Prix from Doha to the only urgent solution at disposal - Elista.
Ok, so Global Chess screwed it by relying on verbal promises from Qatar, without a signed paper, but is this a reason for yet another FIDE bomb? Perhaps this new solution might even work better, we all cried out for candidates matches/tournament and final world championship match. But the frequent turmoils are hurting the credibility of FIDE, if there was anything left of it. The top players are naturally outraged. How can they trust the governing body if there is no consistency and transparency?
And what about the Global Chess? It is now a private company owned by Kirsan Ilyumzhinov and his friend David Kaplan, new FIDE CEO Development. What are they doing and who is controlling them? Where are the marketing effects and new sponsors?
Then, what about the Qatar Chess Association? Their official Khalifa Mohammed Al-Hitmi is FIDE Vice President. What are the consequences for causing this earthquake?
Most likely, nothing will happen and chess politicians will continue with their circus.
ICC's Macauley Peterson and Chessdom were the first to report that the final deal on the match Topalov-Kamsky has been reached. The match will take place on 16-28th February in Bulgaria.
Serbia's Novak Djokovic crushed Nikolay Davydenko 6-1 7-5 to win the Masters Cup Sunday, underlining his credentials as a major challenger to Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer at the top of men's tennis.New York Times
The Australian Open champion, who lost all his matches without winning a set on his debut at the season-ending shootout last year, earned $1.24 million to move to within 10 ranking points of world number two Federer.
Novak Djokovic was the focus of the tennis world at the beginning of this year when, at the age of 20, he won the Australian Open, defeating Roger Federer, then the No1, in the semi-finals.The Guardian
The young Serb's progress has slowed a shade since, although he finished the year as he began by winning the season-ending Tennis Masters Cup with a 6-1,7-5 victory over Nikolay Davydenko, the Russian who knocked out Andy Murray in the semi-finals.
Djokovic came close to claiming the World No2 spot during the French Open from Spain's Rafa Nadal. This week he was much closer to capturing that position from Federer, and will begin next season just 10 points behind the Swiss. Indeed had Djokovic won his final round-robin match against France's Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, then Federer would already have been relegated to World No3, which when the year began would have been inconceivable.
Serbian tennis has had a good year with Jelena Jankovic the number one woman and Nenad Zimonjic teaming up with Belgrade-born Canadian Daniel Nestor on Sunday to win the Masters Cup and take the number one spot in doubles.Yahoo! Sports
"I think Serbia’s getting used to number one so I’ll have to work on that, I guess,” joked Djokovic. “Probably the fact that we didn’t have the best possible conditions gave us more motivation to succeed."
American grandmaster Yasser Seirawan called the U.S. open team "the strongest team that America has ever fielded."More on IHT
While he did not favor them for a medal, Seirawan said that first board Gata Kamsky of Brooklyn, New York, and second board 20-year-old Hikaru Nakamura of White Plains, New York, "are brimming with confidence and are dangerous players who can beat anyone on a given day."
American grandmaster Larry Christiansen said the "Americans are underrated in general compared to the Europeans. If they avoid jet lag, they can finish in the top five."
The Russian team is led by former world champion Kramnik and is the highest-rated team ever to participate in an Olympiad.
Seirawan predicted that Russia would win the Olympiad, with Armenia and Azerbaijan taking silver and bronze.
The Bulgarian Chess Federation will be re-awarded with the event if it accepts in written form, by 14 November 2008 12:00 GMT, to hold the match with a prize fund of 250,000 USD plus 50,000 USD as contribution to FIDE and all organising expenses covered. In this case, the dates of the match Topalov - Kamsky remain as already announced (29 Nov. - 12 Dec. 2008) and I intend to nominate FIDE Vice President Mr William Kelleher of USA as the FIDE Supervisor of the Organising Committee (*duties of the FIDE Supervisor as annex 1 to this announcement).Kirsan Ilyumzhinov says in a press release posted on FIDE website. He also explains how Chernenko abused his trust and so the guarantee is valid no more.
At this point I must say that I have deeply regretted the trust which I had shown to Alexander Chernenko, concerning the reliability of his offer. The actions of Mr Chernenko indicate an abuse of right to invoke my guarantee which was declared after his own request and in good faith to help him secure the necessary funds.
Barack Obama elected as US President. Doubt anything will change for Cuba though.
Chauvinist uses the opportunity to lecture us on racism.
Homer Simpson voting...
While English media are celebrating (or just tagging as "lucky") Harry Redknapp, the new manager of Tottenham Spurs who have just beaten the leading Liverpool 2-1, I think Jamie Carragher was unjustly left out from headlines. The usually reliable defender has put in his third goal in the matches against Tottenham - but all of them in his own net!
It took him ten years of waiting to accomplish this, as he previously scored own-goals against Tottenham way back in 1998 and 1999. Can he keep it up? We'll know next spring.
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