Online Chess Olympiad: India and Russia win gold medals

Bengaluru, Aug 30: India and Russia were both awarded gold medals, after an internet outage affected the finals of the online FIDE Chess Olympiad on Sunday.

Playing in their first final, India drew their first match against Russia. India had the upperhand in the first game, but Russia fought back from a couple of very tough positions to hold their opponents.

In the second match, two Indian players Nihal Sarin and Divya Deshmukh lost connection to their games and forfeited on time.

Following an investigation into the matter, FIDE president Arkady Dvorkovich decided to declare them joint winners and awarded gold medals to India and Russia.

🇷🇺 Russia and India 🇮🇳 are co-champions of the first-ever FIDE Online #ChessOlympiad.

Tournament's website: https://t.co/bIcj0hRMek #chess #IndianChess #шахматы pic.twitter.com/gP4sULP2kr
— International Chess Federation (@FIDE_chess) August 30, 2020

In an official statement Dvorkovich, said, “The Online Chess Olympiad has been impacted by a global internet outage that severely affected several countries, including India. Two of the Indian players have been affected and lost connection, when the outcome of the match was still unclear.

“The Appeals Committee has examined all the evidence provided by Chess.com, as well as information gathered from other sources about this internet outage. After being informed of their considerations and in absence of an unanimous decision, and taken into account these unprecedented circumstances, as FIDE President I made the decision to award Gold Medals to both teams.”

Results:

Match 1: India - Russa 3:3

Vidit ½-½ Nepomniachtchi

Harikrishna ½-½ Artemiev

Koneru ½-½ Lagno

Harika ½-½ Kosteniuk

Praggnanandhaa ½-½ Sarana

Divya ½-½ Shuvalova

Match 2: Russia - India

Nepomniachtchi ½-½ Anand

Dubov ½-½ Vidit

Goryachkina 1-0 Koneru