Olympic Medals and India

Few people seem to care, but there is an Olympiad going on. Out of 150 countries participating, India is seeded second and is actually expected to win medals. As we all know, India and Olympic medals are not often used in the same sentence. If we forget about the glorious past of field hockey, the country of one billion people has managed to win exactly four individual medals in sixty years. So when an Indian team is seeded second out of 150 teams in an Olympic event not named Kabbadi, it calls for a celebration.

India is fielding its strongest team ever and it should improve on its best ever result of sixth-place finish at the last Olympiad. Their seeding is primarily driven by Anand's monstrous rating, but overall it is a very balanced team with Sasikiran on the second board, Harikrishna on the third and Suryashekhar the-other Ganguly on the fourth. The bench strength of Sandipan and D P Singh is a bit suspect though. I think Ganguly and Sasikiran hold the key. Both are aggressive and tactically very strong. The team will need quite a few 3.5-0.5 and 3-1 wins to finish among the medals. To do that Sasikiran and Ganguly will have to take some chances even with black.


Currently India is clubbed with four other teams at 12-16 in the ranking table, but it is early days yet and they are only two points behind the leaders - Russia and Armenia. There is enough time left to come back from that shocker of an opening round against Morocco. The extra two odd points lost there could, however, still cost them dearly. Germany, the sixth round opponent, is a very experienced side with two veterans - Jussopow and Graf. It should be a very interesting match tomorrow.

India has a very good chance of winning a medal in the women's section as well. They are the ninth seed and can definitely finish in top three if Koneru Humpy gets strong support from Swati Ghate, Harika Dronavalli and Mary Ann Gomes.


Chess Olympiad historically has not always attracted the top players and Anand himself skipped it for a long time. However, on reading his rediff interview immediately after the last Olympiad, one gets the impression that he badly wants India to win an Olympic medal. From a purely chess perspective, that is a bit surprising coming from a player who has twice won Chess Oscar ahead of Kasparov and has won every major tournament in the world. Olympic medals are not the topmost priority for the top chess players as they are not for the top tennis pros. I think Anand shares the frustration of Indian sports followers and realizes KD Singh Babu, Leander Paes, Karnam Malleshwari and Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore could use some company. If he can help India win the gold that eluded even those four great individuals, it would be the first time in 28 years that a country other than USSR (or former USSR) would come out on the top. It would also be the first time in 67 years that a non-Eastern-European country would win.