Candidates Tournament to Take Place in Yekaterinburg from March 15 till April 5

Respective agreement was signed in Moscow.

The 2020 Candidates Tournament, in which eight top grandmasters will contest for the right to challenge the current World Champion Magnus Carlsen (Norway), will be held in Yekaterinburg from March 15 till April 5.The respective agreement between FIDE, CFR, and the organizers was signed in the Central Chess Club in Moscow on November 11. The document was signed by FIDE President, CFR, and the President of the Sverdlovsk Region Chess Federation. The event was attended by the 12th world chess champion, CFR Vice-PresidentAndrey Simanovsky: “Thanks for choosing Yekaterinburg as a host city for the 2020 Candidates Tournament. We have everything to make it a great event and will try our best to deliver”.Arkady Dvorkovich: “We are happy to continue our cooperation with the Chess Federation of Russia and are thankful to them and the Sverdlovsk Region Chess Federation for their bid. Today on behalf of the FIDE Presidential Board, I’m glad to sign an official agreement to host this key event in Yekaterinburg. This tournament will decide who will face the world champion Magnus Carlsen in the World Championship match that will take place in November 2020”.Andrey Filatov: “We are grateful to the Sverdlovsk Region Chess Federation for their interest and constant support of chess in Russia. It’s a pleasure that we have trust from FIDE to organize such an important event. The decision to host this event in Russia guarantees that there will be a Russian player participating. We’re still considering different options how we’ll choose a Russian wild-card but it will probably be a match or match-tournament with Kirill Alekseenko, 3rd place finisher in Grand Swiss, taking part in it”.Anatoly Karpov: “I’m regularly visiting Yekaterinburg and admire how the city has recently flourished. Yekaterinburg has all needed infrastructure to organize the best Candidates Tournament in the history of chess. As a member of the Organizing Committee, I’ll be there myself taking part in the event’s cultural programme”.Four participants of the Candidates Tournament are already known: Fabiano Caruana (USA), Teimour Radjabov (Azerbaijan), Ding Liren and Wang Hao (both China). Two other participants will be determined following the results of the Grand Prix Series; one slot will be granted to the player with the best average rating in 2019. The eighth participant will be nominated by the organizers.

Photos by Eteri Kublashvili