What does it take to nudge chess to the next level?
IT WAS like déjà vu. Way back in 1974, I was part of a group of chess enthusiasts who came to Kuala Lumpur to attend the first official meeting of the Malaysian Chess Federation.
Last Sunday, I was again part of a group of chess enthusiasts who had come to Kuala Lumpur to participate in an informal discussion with like-minded people.
In both cases, the objectives were the same. At both meetings, we tried to find ways to take Malaysian chess forward. However, there was a difference. Then, chess was only known in a few pockets of the country, notably in Kuala Lumpur, Johor Baru and Penang. But now, I can say that the game is played in all the states and there is considerable interest everywhere.
But despite the wider recognition of chess in today’s society, we are unable to take the game to a higher level.
Today, we have five international masters but we are still way off the target for a grandmaster. We may have close to 200 players on the World Chess Federation’s rating list but this is a trickle compared to the hundreds of thousands of players listed there.
We have players rated 2400 or above, but the international rating list is full of players with ratings of at least 2600. Today, we have chess organisers holding enough events to fill up our local chess calendar but we are not uncovering enough talents.
So the meeting in Kuala Lumpur on Sunday was to brainstorm on the ways to move chess forward. Though the meeting attracted close to 40 people who were mostly from the Klang Valley, the numbers could have been higher. Chess players and organisers from beyond this region were greatly missed. Their input could have been very important.
Nevertheless, a lot of good ideas were heard. What I particularly liked was Jimmy Liew’s contention that chess, like other games, needed a hero. We needed people whom our young players can look up to and emulate.
But, in my opinion, the closest we have ever come to having one is Mas Hafizulhelmi. Yes, for sure he is a nice guy and works very hard at his chess. But he is still not visible enough to produce excellent results and he doesn’t have the results to become more visible. It is a vicious cycle and a way must be found to break it.
There was also talk of branding and marketing. Everyone agreed with one point, that chess has never been an easy game to promote. Maybe it is time that our chess organisers adopted a more business-like approach to the matter and think about the benefits and advantages of chess, and use them to promote and market the game.
The persons running chess centres need not even be chess players as long as they are good in marketing and turning their ideas into concrete courses of action.
As for product branding, the suggestion was that chess centres like the Datuk Arthur Tan Chess Centre (DATCC) must present a face to their names so that people can associate better with their activities. No point calling it the DATCC when nobody knows what Arthur Tan looked like.
There was also talk of making chess centres a safer and friendlier place to attract both children and working adults. They could be places for adults to hang out and relax with friends after work over a few chess games as well as a place parents would want to bring their children to for evening visits.
But at the end of the day, I suppose the most critical question would be: how would the suggestions be implemented and who would be spearheading them?
I think that it is out of the question for the Malaysian Chess Federation (MCF) to implement them. The MCF’s role is only governing and administering. This leaves the operations side of chess, and this should involve the people on the ground. But unless they are in a position to raise their own funds for their own chess promotion and marketing, I think much of the proposals will ultimately be left unfulfilled. Sad but true.