The past year in chess has, _ab ovo,_ been an unexpectedly turbulent one, due primarily to the increasing eccentricity of the World Champion, Magnus Carlsen. Having defended his title for

the fourth time, seeing off such giants as Anand, Karjakin, Caruana and Nepomniachtchi, Carlsen promptly announced his retirement as champion, but, crucially, not his retirement from

competitive chess. This has been badly thought through, since by staying active on the chess scene, Carlsen automatically devalues the prestige of the championship, from which he remains an

exiled ghost. When Morphy and Fischer, those twin American meteors, retired, admittedly prematurely, from their obligations to their fans and the public, at least they had the decorum to

chess world since the premature halting by FIDÉ of the 1984/1985 World Championship between the incumbent, Karpov, and his challenger, Kasparov, when the former seemed in sudden danger of

losing. After a defeat against the American teenager Hans Niemann, Carlsen promptly implied that his vanquisher had been cheating, withdrew from the tournament and defaulted his next game in

a subsequent event against Niemann, after a couple of moves. The accusations have now escalated to become the subject of a multi-million dollar lawsuit, which may make Niemann one of the

wealthiest teenagers in the USA, while depriving Carlsen of much of the fruits of his recent $80m sale of his Play Magnus group to Chess.com. The consensus, supported by a major article in

_The New York Times_, is that Magnus Carlsen has overreached and that the accusations by him and his acolytes lack foundation. In over the board competition, astonishingly, the Chess

Olympiad this year was won by the youthful team from Uzbekistan, led by teenager Nodirbek Abdusattorov. Russia was banned from the Olympiad as a consequence of Putin’s illegal invasion of

Ukraine, one other result of which has been the retrospective realisation that many grandmasters, formerly regarded as Soviet, were in fact proud Ukrainians. The Ukrainian roll of honour

includes such luminaries as Bogoljubov, Boleslavsky, Bronstein, Stein and Ivanchuk. Paradoxically, Arkady Dvorkovich, the pro-Putin Russian President of FIDÉ, the world chess governing body,

remains in power after this year’s election. He is supported, in a psephological master stroke, by the Indian former world champion, Viswanathan Anand, as Deputy President. Nigel Short

escaped the general cull of Putin critics, metamorphosing from Vice President to FIDÉ’s Director of Development. Meanwhile, apart from the Uzbek triumph, it is becoming clear that the rising

generation of superstars are largely of Indian origin. This includes 13 year old Shreyas Royal, now a UK citizen, who has notched his first grandmaster result, and will doubtless go on to

greater things. Shreyas is one of that group of young talents trained by the teacher I like to call the Praeceptor Britanniae, Julian Simpole. His former pupils, both Grandmasters, include

Luke McShane and David Howell, the latter now very much one of the admiring circle of  courtiers of Magnus Carlsen, the once but probably not future king of chess. Another  astounding 

youngster has also pushed to the fore by taking second prize in an important UK female tournament. Bodhana Sivanandan finished second at the British Women’s Blitz Championship. She actually

started the event with 8.5 out of 9. The amazing thing is… she is just 7 years old! Three of the contestants were titled players. Good riddance occurred in the demise of the paedophile Brian

Eley, to our eternal shame British chess champion in 1972, who died in ignominy in his bolthole in Amsterdam earlier in the year. There must now be a case for reviving the imperial ancient 

_Damnatio__ Memoriae. _This Roman tradition for bad emperors, such as Caligula, Nero, Domitian and so on, meant erasing all their works (which if enacted would leave myself and Dr Jonathan

Penrose, who also passed this year, as co-champions for 1972). Now, more sad news: the deaths of that great world ambassador for chess, Yuri Averbakh, the planet’s oldest grandmaster, and of

that unique genius of British chess, Michael Basman, both also during this year, with Basman’s funeral having taken place on Saturday December 10. I am actively lobbying the English Chess

Federation to recognise Basman’s unusually lengthy six month tenure as co-British champion (before losing the play off to Bill Hartston) with official recognition as joint British champion

for that extended period. And finally, three times British Ladies champion and one time USA Open Champion Dinah Norman (née Dobson) continues her fight back in hospital after being the

victim of a motorcycle delivery man which left her with severe injuries. I, in common with all readers of this column, wish her a full recovery over Christmas and the New Year. Normal

service will resume in the first week of January. Meanwhile, here is a link to a couple of the best games of the year, both of which celebrate the renewal of talent that we will undoubtedly

and increasingly witness in the New Year. The first game features a subtle game of manoeuvre between two of the aforementioned Indian teenage talents, the loser being sixteen years of age,

the winner a veteran of seventeen, Praggnanandhaa vs. Venkatesh. And to round off, a devastating win by our most promising 13 year old against a Russian grandmaster: Royal vs. Cherniaev. I

hope you relish these two wonders and also enjoy the festivities, as we move into another year, where hope and promise may, to hijack a term from a fellow mind sport, trump the violations,

accusations  and turbulence which have so deeply shaped  both the initial flames and the dying embers of 2022. And just as I sign off, I have received an appeal from Jitendra, Shreyas

Royal’s father, to help create a new British World Chess Champion. Shreyas plans to compete in 15 tournaments next year, to acquire the grandmaster title, and push his rating over the magic

threshold of 2500. For this he needs a world class trainer plus finance to compete in the requisite events. Can readers of _TheArticle_ help? Yes of course we can! Please contact me via

[email protected] for any and all offers of both individual and corporate assistance to help create the first British World Champion since the days of Howard Staunton, from 1843-1851. In

terms of obtaining that all so important visa to stay and early coaching, both Julian Simpole and I have already made our pro bono contributions. So far, so good, but now to ascend the

ultimate Everest of world chess, Shreyas needs a professional coach, one  who has competed at the highest level in contemporary chess and can combine this experience with superlative

communication skills. So… Readers, over to you in the ongoing campaign for a new British World Champion. If Magnus wishes to shed the robe of global hegemony , drown his book and break his

staff, then Shreyas is waiting eagerly in the wings, hungry for glory and afire with youthful ambition to triumph on the world stage. _Raymond Keene_ _’_ _s latest book _ _“_ _Fifty Shades

of Ray: Chess in the year of the Coronavirus”, containing some of his best pieces from TheArticle, is now available from _ _Blackwell_ _’_ _s_ _. HIS 206TH BOOK, CHESS IN THE YEAR OF THE

KING, WITH A FOREWORD BY THE ARTICLE CONTRIBUTOR PATRICK HEREN, AND WRITTEN IN COLLABORATION WITH FORMER REUTERS CHESS CORRESPONDENT, ADAM BLACK, IS IN PREPARATION. IT WILL BE PUBLISHED

EARLY IN THE NEW YEAR._ _ _ A MESSAGE FROM THEARTICLE _We are the only publication that’s committed to covering every angle. We have an important contribution to make, one that’s needed now

more than ever, and we need your help to continue publishing throughout these hard economic times. So please, make a donation._