Nihal Sarin to lead the Indian charge at FIDE Cadets and Youth Championship

The FIDE Online World Cadets and Youth Rapid Championships is slated to begin today. A total of 16 Indian players, led by 2620 rated Nihal Sarin will be representing the country in the tournament.

During the Asian selection round for the tournament, 10 Indian youngsters earned podium finish to earn a direct entry into the tournament while 3 entered as wildcard and the other 3 qualified on the basis of their international rating.

A four day tournament, the FIDE Online World Cadets will see players around 160 players from 51 different countries fighting it out online to clinch a total of 10 gold medals which are at stake in five age categories in both Open and Girl’s section.

USA will see the highest number of representations with a total of 23 players, followed by India and Russia at 16 and 15 respectively. Out of the total 160 players in the fray, 8 are Grand Masters out of which three – GM Nihal Sarin, GM Paneerselvam Iniyan and GM Dommaraju Gukesh are from India.

The 16 year old Nihal Sarin is the second seed in the U-18 category which will also have P. Iniyan and IM Sankalp Gupta fighting it out for the title.

While, Nihal Sarin earned a direct qualification in the U-18 section, Dommaraju Gukesh and FM Savita Shri qualified directly in the U-14 section.

The 10 players who earned qualification through podium finish in the Asian selection round are – Mrinmoy Rajkhowa (U-10), Shreya Hipparagi (U-10), Mrittika Malik (U-12), Jyotsana L (U-16), Rakshitta Ravi (U-16),Pranav V (U-14), Aditya Mittal (U-14), P. Iniyan (U-18), Sankalp Gupta (U-18) and Priyanka Nutakki (U-18).

The three wildcards include Anupan Sreekumar (U-12), Sahiti Varsini (U-12) and Raja Rithvik (U-16).