Rapport från OS av lagkaptenen till våra framgångsrika damer
For my friends who do not speak Spanish: FINAL SUMMARY OF THE OLYMPIADE IN BAKU
Now back home after the Olympiade that left me many satisfactions. Collectively we have recovered the prestige we lost in the European Championship in Reyjkavik by a bad decision from the Swedish federation to go without a coach .. and of course without Pia. We've also got one of the best results of Sweden in the Olympiade along with Calvia in 2004.
We started in position 43 and finsihed 23rd, also in my style without ties, with 7 wins and 4 losses, getting to play against 8 stronger teams in ranking and 3 lower than us, winning against the latter and against 4 of the stronger teams.
I think more can not be asked and especially because we were missing the second best Swedish player Ellinor Frisk, who made bronce medal on 3rd board in Tromsö.
Emotionally it has also been for me a very special Olympiade because it was the debut of my daughter Anna who has also more than fulfilled the expectations I had on her. I remember what she told me in Tromsö " papa in the next Olympade I 'll play in the team " became true. Now during the closing ceremony the last day when Pia collected her bronze medal Anna told me “ dad in the next Olympiade I will be there”.
It's not easy but if she follows this progression and ambition anything is possible , why not ?. On individual level I will summarize the performance of my vikings.
1) Pia Cramling. As always making a great Olympiade with 8.5 points from 11 on first board, giving her another bronze medal in a row , and already having the gold, silver and bronze medals from different Olympics If we add that she has played the last three consecutive Olympiades without losing any games and has been unbeaten for 35 games (in the Olympiades) I think this setting a record difficult to beat. She got 2 bad games against Atalik and Arakhamia but with her usual fighting spirit Pia was able to defend the indefensible. She had no problems in the other 9 games. Sweden can not carry a team to any serious competition without her and it is strange if they do not understand that. .
2) Inna Agrest. In the absence of the second best player Ellinor Frisk as I wrote before I was pleasantly surprised by Inna because she has really played well with a very important result for the team 6.5 points out of 11, playing every game like Pia. She played very aggressive but unlike in Tromso with good control in her games. If she continues in this way I think she can go up a lot of rating points. She has the strenght but we have to see if she also has motivation.
3) Jessica Bengtsson. She was the one who scored less with 2.5 of 8 points but I am particularly happy with her, She is a very good teamplayer because she never creates any problem and gets along well with everyone and that is important for the teamspirit. She plays and can play a lot better than she did in Baku , the problem is that she is playing some openings that do not go with her style, perhaps not well prepared theoretically, but she has talent and understands chess very well, therefore I think that her problem is easy to overcome. I already said that the Swedish Federation should have organized some concentrations before the Olympiade like we had before Tromsö. You can not during the Olympiade change certain things .
4) Angelina Fransson. For me the big surprice. It is the first time she play in my team and therefore I did not really know her strenght but she played a very quality chess and her points 5 out of 7 has been very important for our final classification. She won two very important games in our matches against Spain and Czech Republic the last day, which gave us two very important team victories. She had the handicap of not being able to play more because she suffered stomach pains for several days but I am super happy with her performance Also important that she plays fast and does not get into time troubles.
5) Anna Cramling. It is difficult to assess objectively my own daughter but I will try to do it. It was her debut in the Olympide and for us who are into this we know that it is very difficult the first time. It seems that everyone is watching you but in her case it was true. Perhaps because she is the daughter of Pia people were curious to see her play and how she is. You could note it with journalists who loved to take pictures with her and players too. Whether you want it or not it creates an added stress to the logical nerves of a debut. In any case I got a huge satisfaction to see that she did not disappoint the hopes placed in her but played with a maturity rarely seen in such a young girl. She took 3 out of 7 points, also playing 5 black and 2 white games and was faced with 2 players with less ranking and 5 not only with more ranking but 4 of them even had 300 elo points more than her. She had some winning positions that ended up in draws and lost one game that was a draw because of her timetroubles. But that is something she will overcome with time. More important is that she is deep in her analyzes during the games and has no fear to face opponents who are stronger than her or always play black. That is very good for a team. She was after Angelina the player who gained more ranking and I give her a high grade in her debut coming from someone as demanding as I it has double value.
My team made an overall rise of 76 points distributed like this (in Elo) : 1) Pia +13,2 2) Inna + 13 3) Jessica -19 4) Angelina + 52,6 5) Anna + 17,6 Congratulations!! Not everything is as nice as it looks and being objective I like to say things that are done well and also what is not done so well. I have no choice but to criticize the attitude of the head of the Swedish delegation Stellan Brynell. Despite of our great performance and delivery of individual medal to Pia Cramling, something that should be a pride for the Swedish chess, he did not have the dignity to attend the closing ceremony probably depressed by the bad result of the men's team that he was the captain of. As a delegate and head of the Swedish representation in Baku that was not good at all.
Sweden need to get better results a person who loves women's chess and can take care of it and is looking for the best conditions for the women, so there are concentrations organized with the players and someone who follows the young talents. If that is not done what happens is what we see now and have seen before that our best talents leave chess and there are many cases like that in Sweden. I always say what I think, like it or not. Here it is my message
