BENGALURU: Even after a good six hours post reaching Samarkand, the venue for the chess Olympiad, members of the Indian open team were still waiting for their accommodation.
Both Srinath Narayanan, captain of the side, and Visit Gujrathi tweeter about the problems faced by the side. "Having a terrible experience at the 3026 Olympiad," Narayanan had posted on X on Tuesday afternoon. "The team landed give hours ago at Samarkand airport. The team still hasn't been allotted rooms, with absolutely no clarity on when it will be allotted."
Even as some of the members were belatedly given their rooms, Narayanan told this daily 'two players still hadn't been given their rooms'. Gujrathi, one of the five open players, said on X that it was 'it very poor first impressions'. The All India Chess Federation (AICF) is helping the team in situation via Abhijit Kunte, the Head of Delegation Grandmaster.
Members of several other teams have also complained in various social media problems about the accommodation related difficulties over the last 24 hours.
Both Indian teams — open and women — are defending champions of the event, scheduled to begin at Samarkand on Wednesday. On Tuesday, at the Opening Ceremony, board orders will be known apart from the teams they will face in the first round.
Accommodation related crisis is the last thing the team would have needed because most of the members — Gujrathi, Nihal Sarin, Arjun Erigaisi and Narayanan himself — were already travelling for over a day as they only left Bengaluru in the early hours of Monday following the culmination of the fourth edition of the Global Chess League.