The Gashimov Saga

The Gashimov Saga

The latest development was the resignation of team captain, Zurab Azmaiparashvili, who, in a strange twist of fate, called for Gashimov’s reinstatement and talked of how his association with Kasparov hindered his chances of remaining a FIDE Vice President. Before getting to that, however, it’s worth recounting the whole course of events since the story was last reported here.

Back then one of the main reasons the sports hierarchy gave for Gashimov being left out was that he played for the Kasparov-Marcote team in the Spanish Championship. Azmaiparashvili implies that Gashimov chose not to play for his national team, and this was the dominant theme of a press conference held in Baku on 14 September. Elman Rustamov, President of the Azerbaijan Chess Federation, was quoted as saying: “We didn’t expell Gashimov from the team – he decided not to play himself. Our doors were open to him, but he had to come and make peace with all the members of the team and admit his mistake. In my opinion in the current situation we can talk about a “star illness”. After the European Championship Vugar Gashimov fell ill with exactly this ‘star illness’.”

Here is the full article on Chessbase.