Alexander Zhukov and Andrey Filatov assessed the main problems of Russian chess

– Alexander Dmitrievich, you are one of the most authoritative people in the country, not only in the economy, in politics, but also in sports. They headed the Chess Federation, the Russian Olympic Committee and were members of the IOC. How do you assess the transition to the Asian Chess Federation, and how necessary was it, in your opinion?

— I am very positive about this event. I’ll start with the fact that today, it seems to me, unlike in recent times, the center of chess life and the strongest chess players are mostly concentrated in Asia. This, of course, includes Chinese chess players, and especially female chess players. These are, of course, Indian, Iranian chess players. The Olympics were won by our former compatriots from Uzbekistan. There are amazing young talents growing up who are claiming the title of world champion. If you look at the youth chess Olympiads and the world championship, Asian athletes dominate there. In general, in terms of competition, in terms of concentration of the best chess players in the world, I think Asia is in the lead today. And in this sense, we do not lose anything, we only win. Well, besides, those of our chess players who want to participate in European tournaments have such an opportunity.

— Andrei Vasilyevich, how was this issue technically resolved?

– We are moving to Asia in a legal sense only from May 2. While we are still participating in the selections, we are playing. Now the European Women’s Championship is underway, before that the men won the “gold”. We hope that our girls will perform well and qualify for the World Cup.

The decision to transfer was made on April 14 last year, the Supervisory Board almost unanimously voted for Russian chess players to move from the European Chess Union to the Asian Chess Federation. This happened for the first time in the history of world sports. There were no such precedents. So we basically wrote this history of our sport.

The process itself was interesting, bright, with great discussions with the European Chess Union, and with the FIDE Constitutional Commission, and with FIDE itself, and with the Asian Chess Federation. Everything went well and we are the first federation to make such a transition.

– And in our federation, everyone was unanimously “for”?

– There was one dissenting opinion – Anatoly Karpov, who believed that it was necessary to remain both in Asia and in Europe. His argument was as follows: Russia is one of the few countries that is geographically located both in Europe and in Asia and should be present both there and there. It was legally impossible.

– Alexander Dmitrievich played, as always, speaking in football, ahead of the curve and has already announced the names of the strongest opponents from India and China. Do you think they will be the ones who will oppose our chess players? And I would like you to evaluate how strong Anand is now, who occupies the 9th line in the rating?

— Anand is certainly a planetary chess player. But not Anand will play in the world championship match, but the Chinese chess player Ding Liren. Although there are a few young guys in India now who, I think, will claim the title of world champion in the near future. A new generation is coming from China, and Iranian chess players are very strong, and Indian. And of course, Abdusattorov, a young Uzbek chess player, one of the most talented.

– The match for the title of world champion, which you mentioned, is planned in Astana from April 7 to May 1. Magnus Carlsen refused to defend the title. Nepomniachtchi will play with the Chinese Liren. How do you imagine this match?

– The match will be very interesting, like any match for the world championship. Their chess strengths are approximately equal, but given that Jan already has experience playing in a world championship match, I would still say that he is the favorite in this match.

“We all really want this. Andrei Vasilyevich, what is your opinion?

– We are rooting for Jan, we believe in him very much. It is already in the history of chess. The second chess player in the history of chess to win the Candidates Tournament twice. Before him there was only Vasily Smyslov.

How strong is his opponent?

Filatov: – Very strong. Very lucky. For a chess player, this is a very important quality. Look: he got into the Candidates Tournament only because Sergey Karjakin was disqualified. Liren didn’t qualify for the world championship match after that and got into the fight for the crown only because Magnus Carlsen refused to participate. And now he has a chance to enter the history of chess.

Zhukov: — The problem is that in chess there is one regularity that does not play in favor of Jan: usually a person who gets into the last selection (by the way, not only in chess, in general in sports; there was such a story in football when Denmark in 1992 instead of Yugoslavia got to the European Championship), becomes the champion. But let’s hope that this rule does not play here.

Speaking seriously, of course, Liren is one of the strongest chess players in the world. It’s another matter that he didn’t perform very well in the last tournament, but you shouldn’t give in to such things, because the World Chess Championship match is a completely different story. Every little thing matters here. It seems to me that Jan has drawn conclusions from the match with Carlsen and is quite ready.

— How do you see the situation with Karjakin? How is the work on lifting sanctions from him going? What is the perspective?

Filatov: – Today, Sergey Karyakin has no sanctions, they have ended. They were for six months. And Sergey can participate in tournaments. He has a principled civic position that he will participate only if there is an anthem, a coat of arms and a flag. Today there are restrictions on the line of the IOC. And since FIDE is an associated member of the IOC, it is forced to comply with all the restrictions that are for our teams. For this reason, Sergey does not take part in tournaments that are held under the auspices of FIDE or under the auspices of the IOC. This is his voluntary decision.

– It’s kind of a vicious circle. On the one hand, there are no sanctions anymore, on the other hand, we unconditionally respect his position both about the flag and the anthem, but apparently he will not play in the near future?

Filatov: – One hope – if there is an order from the Motherland, so that Sergei still performs, for example, for the team of our country, then we hope that he will take part.

Zhukov: – I would really like Sergei to play in all tournaments, because even though he became the president of the Chess Federation of the Moscow Region, he nevertheless remains one of the strongest chess players in the world.

— Alexey Sarana, 23-year-old grandmaster, became the European champion. Alexander Dmitrievich, do you follow him, his progress, his game?

Zhukov: — This is another proof that we have a lot of talented chess players who are able to win the biggest tournaments. Well done, what can I say. A very promising excellent chess player.

— What is the current situation in women’s chess?

Filatov: — We are one of the leaders in women’s chess, and we have very good prospects. Alexandra Goryachkina plays not only women’s chess, but also men’s, and quite successfully. Ekaterina Lango is in good shape now, we are waiting for success in the Grand Prix in India. Shuvalov, Garifullina. A young chess player Badelko, who is also very promising, came to us from Belarus. We have a good team. Olga Gunina, Pogodina. The bench is big.

— Alexander Dmitrievich, how is the implementation of the Chess in Schools program progressing?

Zhukov: – Very successful. In general, I must say that we have about a million chess players registered in Russia. Of these, about 400 women. In several regions chess is included in the school curriculum: Kalmykia, Tomsk region, Khanty-Mansiysk.

Filatov: — In 18 regions, the Chess in Schools program is being implemented together with the Gennady and Elena Timchenko Foundation, 400,000 children have gone through this program. Four thousand teachers have been trained. Schools are equipped with textbooks, methodological material, competitions for advanced training are constantly held.

Zhukov: – No wonder. It is no coincidence that Indian and Iranian chess players have such success. This is the result of the fact that chess is taught in their schools. Studies have been carried out and scientifically established that where chess is taught in schools, academic performance in other subjects improves. This is very helpful for children.

— Can you tell us about Alexander Shimanov? He had the 336th line in the FIDE rating, and at one of the tournaments he won in an online team game against Carlsen.

Filatov: — There are quite a lot of chess players who beat Carlsen in our Russian history. And Andrey Esipenko also beat Carlsen, and in classical chess, which is even more important.

Among the miracles of recent times, a very large online tournament was won by Vladimir Kramnik, who retired long ago and decided to shake the old days after all. And a few days ago brilliantly won.

— Andrei Vasilyevich, what major tournaments and projects are coming up? Maybe share?

Filatov: – For the first time in history, Moscow will host the Russian Children’s Championship from April 13 to April 28, in which about two thousand children will take part. We made a special fan zone there. In general, there will be about 20 fan zones in Russia, in Moscow we are creating two fan zones: this is the Izmailovo Hotel and in our chess club, where the match between Jan Nepomniachtchi and Ding Liren will be shown simultaneously, Russian championships will be held, lectures will be given, everything will cheer, comment – all at the same time. I think that the program will be of interest to amateurs and fans and will serve to popularize chess.

See the full interview with Alexander Zhukov and Andrey Filatov in the MK group on VKontakte.