World Chess Blitz/Rapid Player's list released

Full list for Astana World Rapid and Blitz Championships in Astana, Kazakhstan, 1-11 July 2012.

Qualifiers by rating for finals (6-10 July)

01. Magnus Carlsen 2835

02. Teimour Radjabov 2784

03. Sergey Karjakin 2779

04. Alexander Morozevich 2769

05. Vassily Ivanchuk 2764

06. Alexander Grischuk 2761

07. Veselin Topalov 2752

08. Peter Svidler 2741

09. Boris Gelfand 2727

10. Shakhriyar Mamedyarov 2726

Two players for each event are nominated by the host organisers – Kazakhstan Chess Federation

RAPID

Kazhgaleyev, Murtas 2595

Ismagambetov, Anuar 2478

BLITZ

Jumabayev, Rinat 2556

Kotsur, Pavel 2548

Three other players will qualify for the respective Blitz or Rapid Finals from the Semi Finals to be held between the 1st and 4th July 2012.

Officials

CHIEF ARBITER Andrzej Filipowicz (POL)

DEPUTY CHIEF ARBITER S. Yurovsky (KAZ)

CHAIRMAN APPEALS Ignatius Leong (SIN)

GAME COMMENTARY Robert Fontaine (FRA)

ARBITERS

Faik Gasanov (AZE)

Ashot Vardapetian (ARM)

K.Turdialiev (UZB)

M. Ivakhin (RUS)

S. Temirbaev (KAZ)

S. Kim (KAZ)

Anastasia Sorokina (BLR)

Rimma Antonova (UKR)

Ruslan Ponomariov’s Exclusion

The youngest Fide world chess champion Ruslan Ponomariov has tweeted and written in his blogs (ChessVibes) and Facebook: “The last World Blitz Championship took place in Moscow in November 2010. Usually, as opposed to the World Championship, it is held every year, but since 2010 only now has FIDE announced the next one, to be held in Astana, which I only found out recently on the Internet.

I was honestly pissed off at the fact that nobody from FIDE contacted me on this regard and I had to get this information from third parties, despite the fact that already in February 2011 a selection was made where me and another five players were qualified to play in the World Blitz Championship.”