Between the 11th and the 15th of June, teams from all over the world are gathering to play in the 2025 FIDE World Rapid and Blitz Team Championships – at the Novotel in Hammersmith!
We could not pass up the opportunity to play on home ground and have registered a team to take on this monumental challenge: at the time of writing, there are 112 GMs (about 25% of the field!) registered to play for dozens of other teams.
Led by Captain and Club Secretary Adam Cranston, our players will be Marco Gallana (2232 FIDE Rapid), Tom Villiers (2108), Alistair Hill (2095), Ashley Stewart (2056), Kai Hanache (2023), Gaston Franco (2010), Maria-Alexandra Ciocan (1924), Aryaman Ganguly (1604) and Gesneria-Codruta Cepoi (1599). A healthy mix of youth and experience (at least by chess standards)!
Our starting ranks are #44 for Rapid and #45 for Blitz. FIDE Rapid and Blitz ratings might not be too reliable for some players, but nevertheless it is clear competition will be fierce, with the strongest teams including several of the top 10 players in the world such as Hikaru Nakamura, Alireza Firouzja, Nodirbek Abdusattorov, etc.
We hope all our other members will support our team! Keep an eye on our WhatsApp channels for updates and links to games and commentary – we are pleased to hear our friend and member GM Daniel King will join the official commentary team at FIDE alongside IM and WGM Jovanka Houska! Check out which five teams he has picked as the ones to watch:
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But that is not all! We have many members playing for other teams, with the Sharks being one we are already very familiar with: we partnered up with them in 2024 to win the Global Chess League. IMs Peter Roberson and Tom Rendle, plus FM James Moreby are some of their top players.
Other Hammers joining the competition are GM Gawain Maroroa Jones at Malcolm’s Mates, with many members of Team England; Sami Mortazavi at e-therapeutics; FM Supratit Banerjee at English Knightmares; FM Sohum Lohia at Turkish Airlines Sports Club, with other prodigies such as IMs Lu Miaoyi and Faustino Oro; and Zain Patel, Harry Bryant and Raman Vashisht-Pigem at The London Legends. Lots of clubmates to follow! (And I hope I did not miss any others!)
In addition to online streaming, there are tickets for sale on the FIDE website to watch the event at the Novotel. For more info, visit the official website.
Go Hammers!