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NEW DELHI: Mass lockdowns and the Queen’s Gambit have brought windfall gains for chess during the coronavirus, Indian grandmaster Vishwanathan Anand told AFP, praising the “accurate description” of the game from the hit TV show.
Anand, who spent three months stranded in Germany waiting for a flight back to India, said chess has enjoyed a surprise boom during the pandemic, with millions more playing and following online games.
It has been aided by the runaway success of The Queen’s Gambit, which follows the rise of a troubled chess genius, based on American Bobby Fischer, and has set new viewing records for Netflix.
“People sitting at home seem to have discovered the game of chess,” Anand, a five-time world champion, said in a telephone interview from his home in Chennai.
“Now there are 13 million people playing online. And then during the pandemic, there was also a Netflix show about chess, The Queen’s Gambit, and that’s kind of spectacular too.”
While many sports have suffered during the pandemic, chess has thrived. Online platform Chess.com said last month that it had added 2.5 million new members since The Queen’s Gambit launched.
“Like other sports have television audiences, our audiences are primarily online. So all that happened was chess players moved online to join the viewers,” said Anand, 50.
“That doesn’t mean that you don’t have to make adjustments. It was quite complicated and there was a learning curve, but yes, chess has done very well.”
“FEDERER, MARADONA IN YOUR ROOM”
Anand, hailed as the best player India has produced, said that technology had brought about profound changes in chess, and the internet now provides the platform to bring it to a mass audience.
“Almost anyone, even someone who does not know the rules of chess, can follow them online,” Anand said. “It is creating a spectator-friendly experience.”
Vishwanathan Anand became a grandmaster at age 18, world champion in 2000 and continues to rank among the top 20 in the world (Photo: AFP / Kirill Kudryavtsev)
Anand won his first world title at age 30 in 2000, three years after the historic defeat of the supercomputer Deep Blue over Russian world champion Garry Kasparov.
“I was the cross generation. I was 17 when the first chess database appeared. I have worked with computers from then on until today,” Anand said.
“I think computers have changed the way the game is studied. Every person, no matter how weak, how isolated, has the strongest chess player in the world sitting in the room with them always ready to answer any question.
“Think about it, you have Roger Federer and Diego Maradona in your room and they say, ‘Ask and I’ll give you any answer.’ That has been the impact of chess computers.”
Anand enjoyed great rivalries with players such as Kasparov, Russian grandmaster Vladimir Kramnik and Soviet-born Israeli Boris Gelfand.
He said there are still muscular matchups like Magnus Carlsen’s against Fabiano Caruana, the current leading players, and he tipped teenage sensation Alireza Firouzja, who was born in Iran but plays for France, for future stardom.
“YOU NEED THAT TENSION”
He said Russian dominance is increasingly being challenged, with Ding Liren and Wang Hao leading a wave of Chinese players and Caruana at the forefront of a growing American onslaught.
“China may have peaked recently in terms of having two really strong players that stand out, but they have had considerable depth for a while,” Anand said.
“And the other thing is that they are very good at the chess Olympics, so they play well as a team. So we are no longer surprised by the good Chinese results.”
Anand, who became a grandmaster at 18 and remains in the world’s top 20, was playing in a chess league in Germany when most international travel stopped in February.
He kept busy following his favorite soccer team, Real Madrid, making comments and leading India in the Nations Cup online before returning home in May.
But despite advances in technology, he said it was impossible to reproduce the tension and atmosphere of a live game.
“If you want to play, you need that feeling of sitting in the hallway feeling that tension,” he said.
“I think I need to remember all those things again. It’s been a very, very long break.
“We never had the world paralyzed like this.”
