The 2017 round of the event will be hosted by Bandar Anzali while the British chess prodigy Nigel Short will be a special guest to the tournament.
On the first day of Khazar Cup, Short, who earned the Grandmaster title at the age of 19, and was ranked third in the world by FIDE from January 1988 to July 1989, will present a simultaneous exhibition by playing multiple games at a time with a number of other players. The simultaneous display of Britain’s Short is scheduled to be attended by 25 Iranian chess players.
In 1993, Nigel Short became the first English player to play a World Chess Championship match, when he qualified to play Garry Kasparov in the World Chess Championship 1993 in London (Kasparov won, 12.5 to 7.5). As of August 2016, he is the oldest player ranked among the FIDE's top 100 players and is currently ranked #77.
Attracting a total of 60 chess players, the 15th International Khazar Cup 2017 will be competed in Bandar Anzali on January 20-27 with standard time control in which players will have 90 minutes with 30 second increment from move 1.
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