NEW: Chess Schools League on cards

Zimbabwe Chess Federation (ZCF) is set to embark on a nationwide recruitment drive of young budding chess players.

This comes on the backdrop of an impressive showing at last month’s Chess Olympiad, during which the country climbed up the international rankings.

At the conclusion of the 44th Chess Olympiad, which was held in India, Zimbabwe men’s national team climbed up 36 rungs from number 94 to 58, while the ladies moved from 97 to 76 on the world rankings.

They are currently ranked fourth and fifth on the continent, respectively.

Now, the federation is hoping to capitalise on this and grow the game locally.

“Our intentions are to be ranked number one in Africa in the next five years and move into the top 10 on the globe in the next 10 years.

“These were the set targets that came out of our strategic meeting held recently in the capital,” said ZCF interim president Mucha Mkanganwi.

“For us to be able to achieve all that, we have identified three buckets, which are arbitration, coaching, and chess schools.

“We need to catch them young, just like what countries like India and the other top-ranked countries have been doing, where kids between the ages of six and eight start playing the game.

As part of the recruitment drive, in which the national association is targeting schools, ZCF will soon launch a Chess School’s league for both primary and secondary schools.

“We have since finished drafting a memorandum of understanding with a local company that will sponsor a schools chess league for both primary and high schools, and the sponsorship is more than US$15 000.

“We are going to start our own Zimbabwe rating system for these kids and will be publishing the top 100 kids in both leagues every month because ratings are powerful in chess,” he said.