GSC Online Meeting 2022

GSC Online Meeting

on 3 April 2022, 12:00 – 14:15 CET

Report by Pavel Tregubov

Present:

• GSC Chairman Emil Sutovsky
• GSC Secretary Pavel Tregubov
• Bassem Amin
• Marcus Fenner
• Jeroen van den Berg

Summary

I. GSC Chairman Emil Sutovsky reports

1. Greetings.
2. Chess Olympiad. Tough decision to move it to India. Inspections.
3. Candidates. Preparation started in January.
4. Women’s Candidates. Postponed until likely mid-October.
5. Preparation of the Match 2023. Marketing team is already working on presentation and contacts with potential partners.
6. Losing Russian sponsors cost about 1,5M. Reserve funds accumulated in 2020-21 ensure financial stability.
7. Working with Non-Russian sponsors.

Questions:

• About Russian & Belarusian players participation in FIDE events.

Individuals will be allowed under FIDE flag. Teams will not.

• About waiving transfer fees

Complicated issue. Still under discussion.

II. Time control for the Candidates 2022

The GSC Secretary will prepare a poll to be conducted among the participants.

III. World Championship Match format.

Brainstorming on format modifications in order to make the Match more attractive for sponsors and spectators.

The concept of short sets is aired and being actively developed. Finally, the idea of 4 sets of three monocolour games followed by an eventual rapid play-off TB seems to be an interesting and promising innovation. Further discussions and consultations are required. To be submitted for MB.

IV. Women’s Candidates 2022 format

It’s hard to keep the planned RR format in the current situation with 2 Ukrainian and 3 Russian players participating. The idea of switching to KO format (avoiding a potential direct encounter Ukranian vs Russian until the final) seems to be the best possible solution.

V. R&B TB system

The idea of keeping the current TB system but with 4 top ranked players (instead of 2) seems the most appropriate.