Carte Blanche
September 14, 2004, 10:04 PM
I am an avid chess follower and I logged in to ICC (Internet Chess Club) today to follow tonight's 117th New York Masters' Tournament coverage. I was pleasantly surprised to see Bangladeshi GM Ziaur Rahman in tonight's line-up. Based on his rating I thought I'm up for witnessing some good Bangladeshi triumph tonight prior to our Cricket team's southampton adventure (prospect of which isn't that promising). Now I wasn't exactly expecting him to win the tourney, but I thought he stood some good chances to score a few good wins and at least make it to the final round. His first two games were against untitled players (300 and 200 rating points lower than his strength respectively). He won those games alright, as one would expect from a GM. But those wins were nowhere near convincing. As a matter of fact he had completely lost positions. He got extremely lucky in both those games, and won both on flag which he wouldn't have won on classical time controls. It is amazing how he escaped with a victory. I was simply appalled by the level of his play. Anyway, his 3rd round game was against an Israeli GM who had almost the same rating as him. I tried to convince myself saying Zia just had 2 rough games. It's probably rust. He will shrug it off and play better in the 3rd round (specially considering he had the white pieces). Unfortunately he performed awfully in that game and got knocked out. Even the commentators were surprised by the quality of his play (or lack of it thereof). One of them went as far as saying "It is as though Rahman got punished for winning the last 2 games". Many followers, almost all of them who never heard of this guy before, were actually surprised how Zia became a GM.
Anyway, that was the end of it. If you are wondering what point I am trying to make, I don't think I have one. I am just disappointed to see him lose like that. It is almost like our cricket team. Just the way we look forward to a BD match, I was looking forward to Zia's games. As a matter of fact, I was anticipating some thumping wins, for a change. Fair expectations based on his "supposed" playing strength. Just the way our cricket team wins the practice matches, Zia won against the untitled players. Not convincing at all though (just like our cricket team). But when he was lined up against a player of his own level, when it all mattered, he sucked even more. I haven't followed his chess career before today, so I can't quite comment on how he usually fares on other tournaments. But how he played today is nowhere near GM standard. I guess we Bangladeshis always blow it when it comes to performing at events where the whole world is watching.
(sigh)
Edited on, September 15, 2004, 3:09 AM GMT, by Carte Blanche.
Anyway, that was the end of it. If you are wondering what point I am trying to make, I don't think I have one. I am just disappointed to see him lose like that. It is almost like our cricket team. Just the way we look forward to a BD match, I was looking forward to Zia's games. As a matter of fact, I was anticipating some thumping wins, for a change. Fair expectations based on his "supposed" playing strength. Just the way our cricket team wins the practice matches, Zia won against the untitled players. Not convincing at all though (just like our cricket team). But when he was lined up against a player of his own level, when it all mattered, he sucked even more. I haven't followed his chess career before today, so I can't quite comment on how he usually fares on other tournaments. But how he played today is nowhere near GM standard. I guess we Bangladeshis always blow it when it comes to performing at events where the whole world is watching.
(sigh)
Edited on, September 15, 2004, 3:09 AM GMT, by Carte Blanche.