XXII Ciudad de Leon Masters, Chess and TV – a Promising Romance
The local Castilla y Leon channel will broadcast the end of every game live
Report by Chessdom.com
Those who maintain that chess doesn’t fit well on TV have probably never watched the Leon Chess Masters. The players’ faces reflecting a huge tension on time trouble attract even those who know nothing about chess. The Castilla y Leon TV catches the idea: it will produce a daily special program during the tournament (June, 5-7th) and broadcast the end of every game live.
“Rapid chess implies more mistakes and more stress on the players than classical, but I understand it’s a lot of fun for the public. Besides that, the Leon tournament is very strong and well organized. All together, the balance is very positive”, said the Norwegian Magnus Carlsen, the Mozart of chess, in a video recorded interview, shown during the Ciudad de Leon Chess Masters presentation at the Marca newspaper headquarters in Madrid. The Ukrainian Vassily Ivanchuk used similar terms in his good Spanish, wearing his favourite Real Madrid tracksuit. The Chinese Wang Yue, new at the top, stressed: “Both Kasparov and Karpov played in Leon, which is very significant about how important this tournament is”. The participant’s quartet will be completed by the Russian Alexander Morozevich. The big absent this year will be the World Champion Viswanathan Anand, seven times winner in Leon, who also recorded some nice words about this tournament.
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This is great news.