Kasparov on Same Old

Kasparov always has plenty to say. And he has plenty to say about pretty much the same thing. Frankly, he's getting boring. In this very impressive coup by a Belgian bloggger and reproduced in full by ChessVibes, we can basically summarise what Kasparov had to say simply as:

FIDE is bad.

Ilyumzhinov is bad.

I'm still upset over 1996.

Same old, same old.

But by the grace of Caissa, the interview took a somewhat interesting turn. Mr Jan Lagrain, our lucky Belgian blogger, turned matters towards fashion, a little bit on the Olympiad and that other perennial debate about whether chess is a sport or not.

On Magnus' choice of defence against GM Michael Adams in the recent Olympiad, Kasparov was blunt: "I don’t approve of this. In fact I think it’s almost an insult to play such an opening against someone like Adams, a well-known top player. In my opinion Magnus deserved to loose this game." Ouch!

But the former master (apparently, both Kasparov and Magnus have since severed their "apprentice-master" relationship, which I hadn't known til now) does approve of the Norwegian wunderkind's side career in fashion. I agree that this can only be good for chess. Perhaps that 2200-rated Paris Hilton should join him.

Anyway, there's just way too much political scandal in chess. If we're going to put this game on the map, what we really need is a scandal of the salacious kind. The Bermuda incident years ago is already a fading memory.