As hundreds of the world’s chess players left the Gymnastics hall in Baku City of Azerbaijan shortly after the 42nd World Chess Olympiad, majority reflected back with a keen interest at their individual and team performances.
With a great concern however, Uganda’s overall performance will leave lots of questions, provocations and definitely key talking points.
The women’s team finished 117th out of 140 countries, maintaining the same position from the last Olympiad.
Catastrophically, the men side dropped further from 95th to 126th after collecting 11 points (a rise from 9).
Team Uganda arrived late (due to travel hiccups) for the championship and missed the opening three rounds of the event that attracted the world’s finest players.
On a positive note however, Joyce Kabengano, playing on board three attained the title of Women Candidate Master (UCM) after getting the required bare minimum 3.5 points out of 7 games (50 %).
This brings the number of titled ladies to six.
Grace Kigeni, Ivy Amoko, Gorreti Angolikin and Christine Namaganda hold the Woman Fide Master (WFM) title.
Phiona Mutesi is the other Woman Candidate Master (WCM) in Uganda.
Future:
As quoted by WFM Kigeni in her weekly Chess column in the New Vision, ‘Learn Chess with Grace Kigeni’, she predicts the future of chess in the country as bright owing to the participation in international events.
International events such as the Olympiad not only open up opportunities for players to develop their talents, but also a great plat form to acquire the necessary resources.
Kigeni cites the obvious competition and playing experience attained when players face tougher opponents.
Chess players develop when the face tougher players in their line of duty
The Uganda Chess Federation (UCF) and the National Council of Sports jointly sponsored the Uganda Chess team to the Baku Olympiad.