World Team Chess Championship | Swapnil Dhopade appointed India women’s team coach

Grand Master Dhopade will now take over the coaching of India women’s team in the championship in which the team got a wild card entry. The All India Chess Federation has selected the team for the championship and Dhopade joined the side in Kazakhstan directly from the Aeroflot Open in Russia.

“I am feeling great. This is the best opportunity for me to help the Indian team win a medal for the country,” Dhopade told TOI. 

“Since we were unable to perform in the Olympiad we failed to get direct entry in the World Championship as only one team qualifies from Asia. Our teams are very strong. Even rating wise of the individual players we are a strong team and that is the reason we got the wild card.”

The Indian women’s team will be represented by Soumya Swaminathan, Tania Sachdev, Eesha Karavade, Bhakti Kulkarni and Padmini Rout. On the other hand, B Adhiban, Krishnan Sasikiran, SP Sethuraman, Aravindh Chithambaram, and Surya Shekhar Ganguly comprise the men’s team and will compete in the open category at the championship.

“We will get tough competition from three teams including defending world women champions Russia, Asian champions China and Georgia. Looking at the form, experience and the rating of our players we are surely one of the medal contenders here,” the newly-appointed coach explained.