World Amateur Championships 2022 to be held in Malta

The details of the World Amateur Championships 2022 to be held in Malta have been announced by the World Chess Federation (FIDE).

This official world event will take place October 20 and 30 with six world championship titles in play: U2300, U2000 and U1700, each open and women’s.

The top women’s category offers particular potential as it allows entry ranked just below the world’s top 25 girls and roughly top 150 women. The event initially planned for April 2021 will have an increased prize fund of €15,000.

The event follows the European Small Nations Team Championship held at the end of last year, part of the official European calendar.

The last official world event to take place in Malta was the 1st World Youth U16 Olympiad in 1994, which included 12-year-old prodigies Ruslan Ponomariov and Francisco Vallejo Pons.

Before that, the 24th World Olympiad was held in the Great Ward of the then newly-inaugurated Mediterranean Conference Centre in 1980, at which event Garry Kasparov (see photo below) made his Olympiad debut as second reserve for the USSR (gold) at the record age of 17, and winning the bronze medal behind Yugoslavia’s Pedrag Nikolić and Malta’s Andrew Borg.

Entries are strictly through the respective chess federations by September 5. More information is available on the FIDE website.

Garry Kasparov at the 1980 Olympiad. Photo: Gerhard Hund

CM Timothy Mifsud returns to First Saturday IM tournaments

The July 1, 2022 FIDE rating list published last week unveiled a new king atop Malta's active hill. Well, newish.

After a long hiatus, 18th Malta champion CM Timothy Mifsud returned to the board at the June edition of the famous First Saturday IM norm tournaments held in Budapest, Hungary.

Mifsud won the national championship six times (1993-98) and the national junior championship thrice (1992-94), and still holds the record of youngest ever champion (14 years).

Facing nine titled players with an average rating of 2248, Mifsud held his own performing only slightly below his last international rating, including wins against FMs Tibor Bodi and Mark Lyell, as well as draws against GM Tibor Fogarasi, IM Sandor Farago and WIM Isha Sharma.

Timothy Mifsud at the First Saturday IM tournaments in Budapest, Hungary, in June. Photo: Milorad Maravic