Iran is left without enormous sports talents—especially in chess—due to the radical policies of its Government; for example, the obligation to lose by default when facing an Israeli, or the unavoidable veil for their players. Apart from the now Spanish Sara Khadem, European runner-up in the lightning modality last Friday, the oldest of all is Alireza Firouzja, 20 years old, fled from Iran in 2019 and French since 2021. Among the various attractive facets of his profile is that of putting aside her fashion studies in Paris, which have hindered her sporting performance for two years, to focus on the World Cup Candidates Tournament, scheduled for April in Toronto (Canada).
“My thing with fashion is very serious; “I like it a lot,” Firouzja told EL PAÍS this Sunday after winning, in a very spectacular way, his former compatriot Parham Maghsoodloo, 15th in the world, on the 2nd day of the Tata Tournament in Wijk aan Zee (Netherlands), the Roland Garros of chess. However, this passion for fashion is a little squeaky, and not only because it is hardly compatible with remaining in the elite of mental sports, very demanding in terms of daily training hours: a quick survey among the specialized journalists present at the ceremony Friday's opening ceremony unanimously indicated that Firouzja was the least elegant of those who took the stage, dressed in an anorak that he also does not leave in the cloakroom before entering the game room (he hangs it on the chair). This Sunday (in a sweater and jeans) he was the only one of the fourteen participants in the main tournament who was not wearing a jacket.
But the very limited time that journalists have to talk to the players after each game does not allow them to delve deeper into these topics. In any case, Firouzja closed the conversation clearly: “Now I am taking a five-month break to qualify, prepare and try to win the Candidates. But my intention is to return to fashion, so that no one has any doubts that it is something serious for me.”
More paradoxes. Maghsoodloo was on Sunday the antithesis of a chess player recently beaten on the board. Far from appearing depressed, which would be normal, he spoke in the press room with his executioner, his former compatriot and friend – a renegade for the Government of Tehran – in Farsi with a smile from ear to ear for about fifteen minutes. . No less striking is the mere fact that Firouzja is now playing in Wijk aan Zee after two years without doing so in protest of an incident in the last round of 2021: the organizers broke their concentration to move the table where he was playing because they needed to arrange the stage for the dispute of the tiebreaker for first place; and a year later they refused to compensate him financially, as he requested. However, the Dutch organizers agree with those of other elite tournaments that the very tough nut to crack in the negotiations to hire Firouzja is not Alireza himself, but his father and his brother, who always object.
Alireza has always been charming at short distances since he wowed as a teenager. And no one has the slightest doubt that his talent is enormous. Including the number one, the Norwegian Magnus Carlsen, who, fed up with the painful burden of being world champion, announced in 2021 that he would only defend his title in 2023 if Firouzja were the winner of the 2022 Madrid Candidates Tournament, because he was the only one he saw His height. He later explained that he could not bear the prospect of spending several months preparing for the title match only to lose it to someone he considered clearly inferior. The fact is that Firouzja paid for his lack of experience in Madrid, he did not win the Candidates, and that is why the current champion is the Chinese Liren Ding, and Carlsen has announced that he will not play in Toronto to try to regain the crown.
Ding also said, a couple of weeks ago, that his preferred opponent in this year's final duel would be Firouzja, “because of his extraordinary creativity”, although he sees the American Fabiano Caruana, 2nd in the world, as the main favorite. So that the Firouzja case Even more striking, we must add its peculiar way of classifying itself. in extremis for the Candidates: taking advantage of some loopholes in the regulations of the International Chess Federation (FIDE), the young Frenchman played two second level tournaments in France (one of them, expressly organized on the fly for him) with the aim of raising the positions needed on the global roster by December 31. Not only did he achieve it (he is 6th in the world, still far from 2nd, a position he occupied in 2022), but in his last fifteen games he has fourteen wins and one draw.
Firouzja is the youngest star in history (December 2021, at age 18) to surpass the barrier of 2,800 Elo points on the world list; It is something that only 15 chess players have achieved, as difficult as, for example, jumping more than 8.60 meters in length. Given the formidable work of the Iranian Chess Federation over many years to produce at least half a dozen very brilliant players, one wonders whether the Government in Tehran is fully aware of the enormous loss in terms of international image caused by the flight of young players. sports talents, like the case of Firouzja.
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