E-Paper
Injured Firouzja turns to bedside gambit in Bucharest
Firouzja, who suffered an ankle injury after the third round, resumed his campaign in the Super Chess Classic from a specially arranged hotel room set-up
Bengaluru: Alireza Firouzja reclined in his shorts on a bed in a hotel room, his right leg propped up on pillows. Across him sat World Championship challenger Javokhir Sindarov as the two played out moves on a chessboard placed on a table between them. An arbiter sat on a chair near the foot of the bed. It was an extraordinary scene from Round 5 of the Grand Chess Tour Super Chess Classic in Bucharest.
According to the organisers, the French-Iranian Grandmaster had suffered an ankle injury after the third round. He did not play his Round 4 game against Fabiano Caruana. “There are certain games where by the end you’ll get into a highly neurotic state because of all these turmoils,” Grandmaster Anish Giri, Firouzja’s Round 3 opponent said.
“And by the end of our game, Alireza and I were both Firouzja very shaky...and then I heard he even fell. over. I heard it wasn’t so bad at least. This is kind of crazy. I hope he’s going to be fine.” In a position that was drawn, Firouzja blundered and lost against Giri.
On Monday, Grand Chess Tour wrote on its X handle, “Fortunately, the ankle wasn’t broken or fractured. After consulting with his team and the organisers, he has decided to continue playing in the tournament from a special room in the hotel with the agreement of his opponents in the presence of an arbiter.”
It made for an unusual sight.
Though it’s not without precedent.
In the Interpolis tournament - with eight of the world’s top eight players in a double round robin event - held in the fall of 1985 in Tilburg, English Grandmaster Anthony Miles played most of his games lying flat on his stomach on a massage bed after suffering from severe back pain.
He ended up tying for first place.
