Apocalyptic Musings

  World Chess Championship Finally Has a Venue At long last the international chess governing body, FIDE, has selected Geneva, Switzerland for the 14 game match between champion GM Gukesh D of India and GM Sindarov of Uzbekistan. The US and Cyprus are reported to have made bids to host the match.  I can find nothing about the purported US bid.  Stay tuned on that issue.  As the linked article in The Guardian notes, Gukesh has been having a terrible year in tournament competition.  Additionally, the Chinese GM Ding Laren whom he defeated to take the WC title, had been suffering from serious depression after winning the WC title as was not at his career best level of play. Sindarov is the favorite, but in matches as opposed to tournaments, one never knows what could happen. Much will depend on how the early games go.  https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2026/jul/28/geneva-world-chess-championship-gukesh-sindarov 

Akiba Rubinstein For the Club Player:  So Many Openings. Only One Lifetime  The 15th Edition of Modern Chess Openings by GM Nick de Firmian is a mere 748 pages long. Last published in 2008, it is undoubtedly not totally up to date on openings and opening lines developed and played in top level matches since it was last published.  But…the basics are there for any chess player at any level. For club players not aiming to be chess professionals and those not yet retired with eons of free time on their hands, deciding on which openings and defenses to reasonably focus on to improve one’s enjoyment of our game becomes a very real and difficult nut to crack.  This is the first in a series of posts about basic chess openings and defenses that are sound for club players.  Here are my suggestions for dealing with an opponent’s 1. e4. It was the macabre NYC based comedian of the 60’s, Brother Theodore, who quipped, “I knew his first move would be 1.e4, but I was powerles...