2023-08-22 20:35:00
DISPATCH — The French Chess Federation announced today that an online French championship will take place from next year. For the occasion, the competition will be open to non-licensees.
Especially since the Covid-19 crisis, online chess has exploded, with sites like “chess.com“French championships have already taken place there, because the platforms organize them regularly, but this is the first time that a federation has announced an official championship.
As AFP reports, the French Chess Federation (FFE) had 68,000 licensees in mid-August, a record. But she estimates that casual players are “four million”, a number that has doubled in three years, she says.
“We want players who only know chess digitally to be made aware and then be able to go to clubs, compete,” describes AFP Eloi Relange, the president of the FFE.
The games of these 2024 championships will take place in “blitz” (flash), one of the fastest paces, particularly popular on the internet. The 2021 world blitz champion, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, told AFP that he intended to participate in the final phase of the competition after “more than ten years” of absence on the French circuit. Other international tournaments have had his preference.
To organize these future championships, the FFE has partnered with the French platform Immortal Games, launched in 2022.
After several qualification phases, the final table will be played in a hybrid format: the players will be gathered in the same place, but will compete online, under the supervision of official referees.
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