The 10th and last player to join the incredible line-up of the 7th London Chess Classic is none other than England’s number 1, Michael Adams.
It is no surprise the Englishman is the recipient of the organisers’ wildcard, seeing as he has been the English number one since 1999 and was once ranked number 4 in the world.
Despite being the second oldest participant in the field (after Anand), Adams keeps posting impressive performances and has been a member of the world elite for the better part of 20 years now.
Some of the highlights of his career include reaching the final of the 2004 FIDE World Championship and winning the Dortmund Sparkassen Chess-Meeting in 2013. Having played in all six previous editions of the London Chess Classic, the Cornishman will surely yet again be eager to show his best chess on home turf.
Below is the final line-up for the London Chess Classic, with the updated August ratings. The field boasts a staggering 2791 rating average, which, as things stand, makes this a category 22 tournament.
No. Name Country Age Rating Ranking
1 Magnus Carlsen Norway 24 2853 1
2 Viswanathan Anand India 45 2816 2
3 Veselin Topalov Bulgaria 40 2816 3
4 Hikaru Nakamura USA 27 2814 4
5 Fabiano Caruana USA 22 2808 5
6 Anish Giri Netherlands 21 2793 6
7 Alexander Grischuk Russia 31 2771 9
8 Levon Aronian Armenia 32 2765 11
9 Michael Adams England 43 2740 18
10 Maxime Vachier-Lagrave France 24 2731 24
However, this list did not take into account the Biel tournament, which ended on the 30th July and saw Maxime Vachier-Lagrave score a treble, making it a record 4th victory in the history of this event.
Thanks to this performance, the Frenchman leapfrogged Adams to climb to the 16th place on the live ranking list. Vachier-Lagrave now has a live rating of 2744, while Adams follows him closely on 2742.
With only 3 weeks to go until the start of the Sinquefield Cup, we will keep a close eye on the evolution of the world rankings and with a little bit of luck, the 7th London Chess Classic will be the first tournament in history to see the participation of 6 (or more) players rated over 2800 on the official FIDE list.
In order not to miss any updates on the tournament, make sure to follow the tournament’s official website as well as Twitter account!
Fiona Steil-Antoni
Press Officer
Email: press@londonchessclassic.com
Website: www.londonchessclassic.com/
Twitter: @LondonChess2015