Sofia to host 5th M-Tel Master

Sofia will host M-Tel Masters for the fifth time

• The six participants in the super chess tournament (FIDE XXI category) are Veselin Topalov, Magnus Carlsen, Vassily Ivanchuk, Yue Wang, Leinier Dominguez and Alexei Shirov.
• The games will be played in a glass pavilion on the square in front of the National Theatre Ivan Vazov.
• General sponsor of the tournament is the mobile operator M-Tel.

For the fifth time Sofia will be hosting the international super chess tournament M-Tel Masters. The competition will take place from May 12 till May 23. The games between the six Grandmasters will be played in a glass pavilion on the square in front of the National Theatre Ivan Vazov

General sponsor of the tournament is Bulgaria’s biggest mobile operator M-Tel.

In this year’s edition of the tournament will take part the 19^th Wiorld Champion and leader in the FIDE World Ranking Veselin Topalov, the best young chess player of the last years Magnus Carlsen (№ 3 in the world) from Norway, the 2007 blitz World Champion and winner in last year’s edition of M-Tel Masters Vassily Ivanchuk from Ukraine, the best chess player of Asia Yue Wang from China, Latin America’s strongest player Leinier Dominguez and № 1 of Spain Alexey Shirov, finalist from the World Cup 2007 in Khanty-Mansiysk.

The average ELO of the six Grandmasters is 2753, which makes the Sofia tournament FIDE XXI category. Only 5 tournaments in the history of chess have been of the same category.

M-Tel Masters is part of the international chain of chess tournaments Grand Slam that includes three of the world’s strongest tournaments: Corus in Wijk an Zee (Holland), Linares (Spain) and Nanjing (China). The winner in Sofia wins the right to take part in the Final Masters Grand Slam tournament that will take place in Bilbao, Spain in the end of the year.

The patron of the tournament will traditionally be the President of the Republic of Bulgaria Georgi Parvanov.

The time control of a single game is 90 minutes for 40 moves per player and 60 minutes per player till the end of the game. The maximum period for a single game is 5 hours. Each player will play two games against each of the five Grandmasters with exchanged colors. This year again the rules known in the world of chess as “the Sofia rules” will be valid. The opponents cannot communicate during the games and cannot offer a draw. Proposals for a draw can be made only through the Chief Arbiter in three cases: triple repetition, eternal chess and theoretical draw position. When making the decisions the Chief Arbiter will be consulted by Zurab Azmaiparashvili, Vice President of FIDE.

Info by Dimitar Naydenov

Press Center of

International Super Chess Tournament M-Tel Masters

mobile: +359887462873

press@mtelmasters.com

www.mtelmasters.com