Greetings From Hungary: Introducing Australia's Olympiad Team

The 45th FIDE Chess Olympiad has arrived and Budapest will play host to the event which has drawn in 197 countries (more than the Paris Olympics), 381 teams, and over 2,000 of the world's best chess players. Many are first-timers and some, such as legendary Philippines captain GM Eugenio Torre, have reached mascot status by participating in Olympiads for half a century. No matter their age, experience, or rating, all vie for gold and glory for their country.

At this year's Olympiad, the top 10 seeds in both divisions are full of the usual suspects and the USA, India, and China will all fancy their chances to wrest the title from the defending champions, Uzbekistan.

In the women's division, the top five seeds are more compact in terms of average rating. Looking at both seed lists side by side, the most likely team to win the double crown would have to be India.

Now with the hype piece out of the way, we can talk about Australia. This is my third Olympiad as captain of an Australian team (Chennai 2022, and the online Olympiad in 2020) and I am more excited than ever to present to you our teams.

Australian Open Team List

Our Open team this year is an experienced unit and of the five players, three have previously played on board 1 for Australia at some point in an Olympiad.

GM Temur Kuybokarov will lead team Australia from the front off the back of an outstanding performance in Chennai where he defeated his first-ever 2700 opponent, Poland's GM Radoslaw Wojtaszek. Since then Temur has toppled numerous top players, most notably the 2024 FIDE World Championship GM Dommaraju Gukesh. You can see Temur's perspective on the game in the following interview with ChessBase India... 

On board two is Australia's highest-rated active player and with a rating of 2588, GM Bobby Cheng edges closer to becoming Australia's fourth-ever player to reach the 2600 threshold (after GMs Ian Rogers, Anton Smirnov, and Kuybokarov). Bobby's 2713 rating performance in Chennai made him the team MVP and my favorite game of his was a draw with GM Kiril Shevchenko. Bobby walked out of the playing hall and told me the line he needed to play to win before reviewing with an engine (he was bang on).

The Australian champion IM Rishi Sardana is excited to play for Australia for the first time and the prospect of a double GM "Olympiad" norm is the only motivation Rishi needs to play his best chess. Being on board three means that Rishi could face players such as GMs Yu Yangyi, Leinier Dominguez, and Gukesh if (in my opinion when) Australia finds themselves on the top boards.

This year Australia's board four and five players bring a wealth of experience to the table and both have played on board one for Australia. On board four, GM Zong-Yuan Zhao manages to balance GM-level chess with his responsibilities as a doctor and he is capable of knocking over anyone on his day.

For aspiring GMs, the way that Zong-Yuan acquired his norms is quite extraordinary. He achieved all three norms in two months between December 2007 and January 2008. A grainy video from 16 years ago documents the aftermath of Zong-Yuan's achievements and is also the perfect introduction to our final player.

Beware the board five of this Australian outfit. GM David Smerdon is a player who needs no introduction other than the fact that he produced one of Australia's most famous Olympiad moments... drawing with GM Magnus Carlsen while he was the world champion! What made this draw even sweeter was the fact that David had the opportunity to play for a win but chose instead to make a draw due to a sensible team strategy (which was to take any points you can against Magnus).

Australian Women's Team

Due to time constraints here in Chennai, I will primarily talk about the team I am captaining (the Opens) however each round I will provide a brief update about our stellar women's team. Captained by prep-expert and one of the nicest guys in chess, IM Mihajlo Radovanovic, the women's team has a perfect mix of experience; WGM Julia Ryjanova, WGM Jilin Zhang, and WFM Thu Giang Nguyen, as well as first-timers Zhiyuan Shen and WFM Alaina Vincent.

This team has a great chance to outperform their seed as they did in the last Olympiad and other countries should do well not to underestimate them.

Now that we have checked into the beautiful Grand Ensana Hotel on Margaret Island, expect to see updates from me after the end of each round. Some blogs will be shorter than others as my selection, preparation, and administration duties to the players must come first however, I endeavor to make this Olympiad as immersive as possible for the Australian chess community at home. 

Speaking on behalf of the Australian chess team, we are so grateful for the donations to this year's appeal, which raised a record amount of money and means that for the most part, players are breaking even on their flights!