Not bad for a young team
Sports
Wednesday, 26 November 2008 21:12
ALMOST but not enough for the Philippines.
The Philippines threw the full weight of its arsenal against unpredictable Argentina and came away with a decisive 2.5-1.5 win at the close of the 38th World Chess Olympiad at the International Congress Center in Dresden, Germany.
Grandmaster (GM) Jayson Gonzales played the hero’s role for the Filipinos, who battled long and hard to bring honors to the country in the world’s biggest chess stage.
Gonzales, the almost-forgotten member of the team, outduelled GM Fernando Peralta in 46 moves of the Queen’s Gambit Declined to clinch the win for the 38th-seeded Filipinos.
GM Wesley So, who played the top board for the third time in the two-week-long competition, drew his match against GM Rubel Felgaer in 30 moves of the Sicilian.
Newly minted GM John Paul Gomez also halved the point with International Master (IM) Anton Kovalyov in 40 moves of another Queen’s Gambit and GM Darwin Laylo split the point with IM Diego Flores in 34 moves of the English opening.
Impressive as it was, the win was not enough to catapult the Filipinos to a coveted top-20 finish in this biennial tournament, which attracted the world’s leading players from a record 154 countries.
Overall, the Filipinos finished in a tie for 29th to 48th places with 13 points on six wins, one draw and four losses at the end of the biggest and most prestigious chess competition, dubbed as the “Olympics of Chess.”
The Filipinos, however, finished in 46th place based on the Sonneborn-berger tiebreak system used by the Dresden organizing committee to determine the final rankings.
That’s two notches lower than what the Filipinos achieved during the 2006 Olympiad in Turin, Italy.
But not exactly bad for a youth-laden team which played minus Asia’s first GM Eugene Torre for the first time since the 1970 Siegen Olympiad in West Germany.
The team’s 1-2 punch, So and Gomez, are only 15 and 22, respectively.
“The boys deserved to be congratulated for their efforts. They did their best and competed with pride against the world’s best chess-playing countries,” said National Chess Federation of the Philippines (NCFP) president Prospero “Butch” Pichay.
“The Desden Olympiad signals the start of a new era for Philippine chess, with the likes of So and Gomez now taking the place usually reserved for Torre and GM Rogelio Antonio Jr.,” explained Pichay, who left his busy schedule in the Philippines to join the team for a few days in Germany.
“It will also be remembered for producing the country’s 10th GM in Gomez,” added Pichay.
Nonplaying team captain GM Eugene Torre agreed with Pichay’s observation, saying the team performed well considering the strong opposition nowadays and the unexpected change in the scoring system.
“I’m satisfied with the team’s performance. Although the breaks did not go our way in the complicated pairing system, we did well enough to make the country proud,” said Torre, who made his first-ever apperance in the Olympiad in Germany in 1970.
Here is the rest of the story.
The only resolution to this issue is for Obama to release his documents. No matter what your political beliefs and affiliations, it is to your advantage to want Obama to release the documents and put the issue to rest. Support our Constitution. Demand transparency.
???
That left Campomanes the bad egg of the philippines chess for the past decades. Who enriched himself in the FIDE without caring for the Filipino chess players.
LONG LIVE! Honorable PICHAY.
Hey Willie! Let’s keep the Campo bashing and the Pichay bootlicking away from this blog, shall we?
I like my boots licked.
Let us give credit to the best ever Philippine chess leader, the Most Honorable Pichay, to our young and future super GMs Wesley So, Jayson Gonzalez, John Paul Gomez, Darwin Laylo, who carried to torch for the Philippine team.
As for Campo, who used his media connection to unfairly criticize Pichay time and again, it is about time that the Filipino people should know the sordid truth about him.
Not only is he a congenital swindler who used and abused our many Filipino chess talents, who turn off corporate sponsorhips by his personal lagays, Campo is a crook and a felon convicted by the Filipino People’s Court for pocketing over 12 million pesos of the Filipino people’s money during the World Chess Olympiad held in the Philippines, among other bad things he has done.
When asked to account for the 12 million pesos, Campo stated, “I am the President of the world body of FIDE, I do not account to anybody for anything.!”
Now you know, the real story about Campomanes, the permanent honorary
crook of FIDE.
To all of you journo croonies of Campo, show your class and ethics by accepting and telling the truth about this man.
He ain’t and never was a big deal, he had done nothing for Philippine chess, but only did well for himself.
Campo should do himself and all a favor. Just disappear already in your Baguio mansion. Better still, move to Elista.