Liza to compete against men

Women's International Master (WIM) Shamima Akter Liza will be the first female player in 16 years to compete against male counterparts when the Omicon Group 43rd National A Chess Championship gets underway at the Bangladesh Chess Federation today.

The 27-year-old Liza, who became WIM in 2011, qualified for the top-tier competition after finishing ninth in national B championship, a qualifying tournament for the national championship. 

Liza is the lone female participant against 13 male players for the first time since WIM Rani Hamid took part in the same competition in 2001 as the lone female player.

Her participation also gives her the opportunity to earn a WGM norm. If she can secure 9.5 points from 13 rounds, she will go one step ahead to become country's first WGM.

Apart from Liza, there will be opportunities for the other participants to earn International Master (IM) norms by earning nine points in 13 matches, which will also depend on the rankings of the opponents.

There will, however, be no opportunities for IM Abu Sufian Shakil and IM Minhazuddin Ahmed Sagor to earn GM norms as only three GMs out of five are taking part in this championship. However, FM Sheikh Mohammad Nasir, FM Aminul Islam and FM Mehdi Hasan Parag have the opportunity to earn IM norms. Nasir, who earned his second IM norm in the last edition, will get his third and final norm if he can earn nine points. Aminul and Parag have one IM norm each.

However, the reality is that these GM and IM norms are hard to come by through these national championships. GM Ziaur Rahman explained the reasons why the IMs and FMs fail to earn the norms.

"I think the participating GMs are a bit stronger compared to the norm aspirants," said the country's second at a press conference yesterday. "However I think this time the championship will be very competitive as some of the players are in good form."

Sponsors Omicon Group will provide Tk 6.95 lakh out of which Tk 1.5 lakh will be disbursed as prize money.

Bangladesh Chess Federation's general secretary Shahabuddin Shamim, vice president KM Shahidullah, Omicon Group's general manager Ehsan Mahbub and international arbitrator Harunur Rashid were present, among others, at the press conference.