Ian Nepomniachtchi

Russia's No. 1

“The tournament was a bit weaker for me than in 2025. In rounds 6 and 8 I played against young Lev Zverev and Maxim Chertkov, rather than grandmasters with the same points. So, from the favorites, I only met with Andrey Esipenko.

It’s no secret that something is seriously wrong with the rating system. But I hadn’t played in Opens for several years until recently, so I only knew about it from eyewitnesses.

The first wake-up call for me was, perhaps, in Samarkand at the World Rapid Championship 2023, where in the second round I was completely outplayed by a Kazakh junior with a rating of 2100…

I’m saying this because both Zverev (2447) and Chertkov (2298) play noticeably better than their stated ratings. But the problem is that our talented guys, as far as I understand, find it difficult to find strong competitions.

We have plenty of talented juniors, but they have nowhere to play and progress.”