Carlsen not to defend his World title

July 20, 2022 09:03 pm | Updated 09:03 pm IST

Magnus Carlsen.

Magnus Carlsen. | Photo Credit: Reuters

Magnus Carlsen has kept his word. He will not defend his World title.

The confirmation came from Carlsen during a podcast on Wednesday. The World No. 1 had said last year that he would be defending his crown, which had been sitting firmly on his head since 2013, only if the prodigious Alireza Firouzja qualified as his challenger.

The Norwegian felt there was no motivation for him to play another match for the World championship otherwise.

But Alireza had a poor Candidates tournament at Madrid, where he finished sixth. It was won, for the second time in a row, by Russia’s Ian Nepomniachtchi, who thus earned the right to play Carlsen for the World championship match, scheduled to be held next year.

Now the match could be played between Nepomniachtchi and China’s Ding Liren, who had finished second in the Candidates tournament. Carlsen, the world’s strongest chess player of all time, had scored a crushing victory against Nepomniachtchi in the World championship match at Dubai last year.

He had won his first World title beating Viswanathan Anand at Chennai in 2013 and then defended it against the Indian in 2014. He retained the crown after defeating Sergey Karjakin of Russia in 2016 and then Fabiano Caruana of the United States in 2018.

Grandmaster R.B. Ramesh said Carlsen’s decision wasn’t totally unexpected. “But I thought he could have waited for some more time,” he told The Hindu.

“There is a possibility of Anand becoming part of the administration at FIDE and some new ideas would have emerged about the conduct of the World championship. I hope Carlsen will come back to the World championship cycle in the future; he is the game’s biggest draw.”

Top News Today

Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.