Great finish for Malawi reps at C’wealth Chess
The Commonwealth and South African Chess Championships ended on Sunday in South Africa with candidate masters Richard Mbedza, Chiletso Chipanga and unrated star Joseph Mwale emerging among the top 70 players.
The event attracted 814 contestants.
Even in the face of 30 grandmasters and 40 international masters, the Malawians still defied the odds to find their way into the elite bracket as they finished on positions 57, 62 and 67 respectively.
They stand a chance to earn better ratings when the world chess mother body Fide releases the next rankings.
Mbedza and Chipanga finished on seven points, two points behind the champion, Indian grandmaster Abhijeet Gupta who tied on nine points with his runner-up Ukrainian grandmaster Sergey Fedorchuk and third-placed Dutch grandmaster Sergi Tiviakov.
Mwale settled for the 67th slot with 6.5 points while the country’s only female representative Ellen Mpinganjira took the overall 213th position with 4.5 points. But she emerged number 28 out of the 52 ladies who took part in the week-long event.
Chess Association of Malawi (Chessam) publicist Gilton Mkumbwa has described the performance as the best ever for Malawian ambassadors at an international competition.
