Azerbaijani chess player Nijat Abasov's interview to Idman.biz website
- You took the 18th place among 38 teams in the European inter-team Championship. However, you were the rating-favorite of the competition. What do you see as the reason for the failure?
- In chess, you should always be prepared for unpleasant results. We could not prepare optimally for this competition. In team competitions, it is always the chess player who brings the main points. Unfortunately, we did not have such an athlete in this competition. Only Rauf Mammadov's performance can be considered satisfactory. But his capacity deserves better results. Teymur Rajabov had little practice. Until this tournament, he played in very few competitions. No matter how many preparations there are, the lack of practice also affects the result. Shahriyar Mammadyarov's physical condition prevented him from performing successfully.
- You were one of the chess players who scored the least points in the team. And what was the reason for your poor performance?
- The main reason for this was that I participated in many competitions recently. Physically, I did not have the energy to play well in the European Championship. The "Grand Swiss" tournament, which I played before, was a bit more in the calendar. Thinking back after the race, I can say that it would have been better if I hadn't gone to Budva.
- Vasif Durarbeyli and you are the youngest chess players in the team. Did Shahriyar Mammadyarov and Teymur Rajabov's unsuccessful performances affect you psychologically?
- Despite being young, both of us are quite experienced chess players. We try to do our best regardless of the results of our teammates. Nevertheless, we were demoralized after losing our medal chances in the VI round. This is also understandable. Because we were going to compete for a medal. Unfortunately, it did not work. We will try to learn from failure.
- What was the most memorable meeting in the European Championship for you? Which failure affected your performance?
- The most memorable match was against Denmark. Shahriyar Mammadyarov made a sudden mistake in the match where he was clearly superior and brought the game to a tie. After that, he took a risk and lost, and instead of starting the tournament positively, we started as losers. The same thing happened to me in the IV round. We lost the match against Croatia and I was one of the losers. I almost had my opponent checkmate, but my sudden carelessness turned my winning situation into a losing one. Actually, I don't believe in luck factor in chess. But the sports chance turned away from us.
- What can you say about the division of the team by games? Were different results possible if you were in matches you didn't play?
- When looking back on what happened, if the distribution was different, we could have gotten a different result. But I have to mention that we selected the team for each game after consultation as a team. We chose who wanted to play and who wanted to rest. Of course, the captain made the final decision. I think the decisions we made for that moment were correct. We will try to eliminate the shortcomings and be able to make up for such a result in the next race.
Emin Aga
Idman.biz
