BENGALURU: AT the 2024 chess Olympiad, the women's team wiped the floor as they returned with team gold as well as top individual honours on the third and fourth boards (Divya Deshmukh and Vantika Agrawal). While there's no D Harika this time around — she lent a sense of solidity on the top board — her place will likely be taken by the seasoned Koneru Humpy.
But India's big performances could well come from the lower boards thanks to the presence of R Vaishali, now the contender to Ju Wenjun's world crown. Deshmukh, the reigning World Cup winner, will also be a formidable presence as both of these players are known for being aggressive players. Last time out, Agrawal's crushing performance from board 4 (7.5 out of nine) meant she was a banker to bring home a win in almost all matches.
Because the players have clearly been on an upward trajectory ever since, it's why there's heightened expectations. Humpy, when speaking to this daily, said 'the expectation is gold'. "I think people are not ready to accept anything less than gold," the 39-year-old GM said. "I understand that but I don't want to think about it at the start of the tournament. I want to focus on the games and just start well." Does that put more pressure — the 'expectations' — on the top seeds?
Team captain, Swayams Mishra, said they haven't thought about it on those lines. "What happened last time doesn't really matter to us," Mishra told this daily. "This is a new year, the start of a fresh tournament. But, yes, it provides us more motivation to win again."
They will be challenged by usual contenders but one thing which will count in India's favour is that China aren't sending their strongest batch of players. All of their top three players — incidentally the top three rated women's players currently — Hou Yifan, Wenjun and Lei Tingjie — have decided to skip the event. "China, despite not fielding their strongest team, will be formidable opponents," Mishra said. "On Paper, Georgia (seeded second) will be a powerful team, they are quite dangerous."
Humpy, Vaishali and Deshmukh, in a way, also happen to be rivals (two of those three faced off in the women's Candidates while a third, Humpy, withdrew). How does Mishra handle such a dynamic within a team environment? "At the Global Chess League (GCL), Humpy and Deshmukh were teammates so that makes my job a bit easier. But, no, when it comes to playing for the nation, everyone pulls in the same direction. All of them want to win for the country." In the lead up to the event, they had a small five-day online camp where 'chess was discussed' but they also kept it light. "We also played some quizzes on other stuff," Mishra said. "We have discussed some strategies as well." What really worked for them in 2024? Here's Mishra. "All of the players contributed in their respective roles; Divya and Agrawal were in terrific shape. In crunch situations, we had someone out of these two (win their games). That helped us a lot." At the Olympiad, the women's team will be continuing the evolutionary path that they have been on for some time. There was a period of time when Harika and Humpy were the only flag-bearers. That's longer the case. Apart from other GMs, there are upcoming talents like Savitha Shri, still only 19. Humpy spoke about this transformation. "The team will miss her (Harika) but we have new talents like Vantika and Savitha. It all depends on how we perform as a team and how we tackle our opponents. We have a very young team and am really looking forward to it." Players: Koneru Humpy, R Vaishali, Divya Deshmukh, Vantika Agrawal, Savitha Shri Captain: Swayams Mishra Coaches: Diptayan Ghosh, Arjun Kalyan 2018 The last women's team to go back-to-back at the Olympiad was China (2016 and 2018) 3 The Indian women's team are going for a hat-trick of medals in this tournament (bronze at Mahabalipuram in 2022 before the gold at Budapest in 2024).