This year, the World Junior Chess Championship took place at the four-star Palmasera Resort in Cala Gonone, Sardinia, from the 11th to the 23rd of October.

The tournament was played in 2 categories – Open Under 20 and Girls Under 20. Up to 186 players took part. The time control was 90 minutes for the first 40 moves, followed by 30 minutes for the rest of the game, with an increment of 30 seconds per move. There were 11 rounds, and no draw offers were allowed before 30 moves by both players. This is very common in tournaments of this type.

Commentators for the tournament were GM Evgeny Miroshnichenko and WGM Keti Tsatsalashvili, who analyzed various games during each of the 11 rounds.

Girls Section was an impressive movie to watch. In the strong competition, WGM Beydullayeva Govhar led the tournament from the 6th round until the end. For her terrific performance, she surely deserved the gold medal. Even though she lost the last round, she won on a tiebreak, leaving behind Kazakhstan’s WIM Serikbay Assel, with the same points – 8,5. The bronze medal also went to Kazakhstan, to WIM Kamalidenova Meruert, gaining 8 points.

In an interview after becoming the World Champion, Govhar Beydullayeva happily said: “It was my childhood dream to become world champion.”

She added: “Every year I participated in World Youth Chess Championships, but I didn’t have medals. In the previous two years, it was just held online, but it was not in a classical format. I became the world champion there, but it was online, so it was my first time ever to become the world champion under 20. I am very happy!”

In the Open category, a tiebreak decided the fate of 5 players. The bronze medal went to IM Kacharava Nikolozi from Georgia. Hungarian GM Kozak Adam took home the silver medal, having only a slightly worse tiebreak than the World Junior Champion – IM Gadimbayli Abdulla from Azerbaijan.

Gadimbayli not only gained the gold medal but also the GM title. His game with the first seed – Andrey Esipenko, was a critical one as Esipenko had a winning position, but unfortunately missed a tactical combination. The game ended in a draw.

“It’s a fantastic result for Azerbaijan,” said Gadimbayli in the same interview, as it was official that Azerbaijan is about to take double gold back home.

FM Jakab Béla, who represented Slovakia in the Open category, gave us some answers about the tournament.

Q: How would you, shortly, describe the whole tournament?

A: “I was happy to be able to take part in my last Junior World Championship. After a long break, I didn’t know what to expect from myself. However, the first rounds went quite well, and that’s the reason why I’m not satisfied with the final result.”

Béla placed 56th out of 120 players, gaining +4 rating points. He did very well in the beginning, having 4 points after 6 rounds. Interesting fact – Béla had the opportunity to play with an experienced WGM Zhu Jiner. She decided to play her last Junior World Championship in the Open section, and Béla successfully drew.

Q: Which game did you enjoy the most?

A: “I would say that I enjoyed the most the second game, mainly because it was a long and interesting game. You could not tell the result until the end.”

The second game was a battle between Béla and Kozak Antoni from Poland. Béla won the game beautifully with the black pieces.

Q: Was there any idol of yours? Whose games did you watch the most often?

A: “My idol was not there, possibly because I don’t have any. I watched the ones I spent the most time with, fellow passenger Ema Walter, her roommate Anna Marie Koubová and my roommate Richard Mládek. I also watched Adam Kozak’s games.”

Q: What did you find interesting about Sardinia? Would you go back?

A: “Our accommodation was right next to the sea, but we also saw the mountains and mountain climbers’ training. I found it beautiful, and I would go back anytime.”

Q: Lastly – the cherry on the cake question. What chess-related question have you always wanted to answer, but no one ever asked you?

A: “I always wanted to answer the question: ´How are you so good at chess, but nobody has ever asked me… maybe I’m not :/”

Stay tuned for the next articles. Maybe someday you might find out why is Béla so good at chess! 🙂

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