PANJIM: Chess prodigy Ethan Vaz made Goa proud by scoring a podium finish at the U-10 Open National Chess Championship 2021. 9-year old Ethan secured an impressive 10.5 points in 11 rounds while remaining undefeated in the tournament, but the prestigious title of National Champion eluded him by a whisker.
With the one player that he drew against also equalling the score of 10.5, Ethan was tied for first place but had to settle for Silver as Reyan Md was declared the Champion owing to a slightly better tie-break score (Buchholz Cut 1 of 83.5 vs. 82.5). A total of 929 players from all over India had participated in the tournament.
By virtue of the podium finish, Ethan is now officially selected to represent India at the World Cup 2021 (FIDE Online Rapid World Cup 2021, Cadets & Youth, Under 10 Open) scheduled to be held in August. AIM Ethan Vaz, who was a two-time Goa State Chess Champion, had done a hat-trick last month by winning the Goa State chess championship for the third year in a row and had got selected to represent Goa at the Nationals.
Expressing his joy on this occasion, the President of Goa Chess Association and Power Minister Nilesh Cabral said, “It is a great moment for Goan chess to have a Goan player emerge ahead of over 900 of India’s best players, and we congratulate Ethan on winning this honour for Goa.”
The Secretary of GCA, Kishor Bandekar joined him in congratulating Ethan and said, “All of us at GCA are proud of Ethan and his stellar performance. He has earlier won gold and silver medals for India at the Western Asia Chess Championships 2019, and we look forward to him winning laurels for India at the FIDE World Cup 2021 for Cadets & Youth too.”
Born to computer engineers Linda Fernandes and Edwin Vaz, Ethan hails from the village of Raia and is a student of Class 5 at The King’s School, Sao Jose de Areal. He is being coached by Prakash Singh of Chess Guru Goa Academy, Margao.
