El Messi del ajedrez (SPA-ENG)

The Messi of chess

I hesitated to put this title because comparisons are odious and because I do not want to contribute to what I am going to comment on here in the development of the publication.

I'm talking about Faustino Oro, the 10-year-old Argentine boy who is causing a sensation in world chess and just these days he is participating with 5 other compatriots in the XVII Absolute Continental Chess Championship of the Americas 2024 that is taking place in Medellín, Colombia.

In this tournament under the Swiss system, 387 players participate, of which about 60 have the title of Grand Master or International Master.

So far, having played 8 of the 11 scheduled days, he is perched in the top positions with 6 points and if he continues along this path, he will likely be able to add a new standard to soon reach the title of Grand Master and become the youngest to get it.

In Spain they have given him the label of "Messi of Chess" and here many have jumped on the triumphant bandwagon. A few days ago, the news broke that the young talent is part of the first high-performance training plan ever created. implemented in South America, yes, oddly enough, a training plan subsidized by companies and private patrons has just been created, the first to be developed in our subcontinent, something very common in North America, Europe, and Asia.

As I mentioned in another publication a few days ago, the majority of South American athletes have little chance, not due to lack of talent and training but because they do not have the necessary means to develop at the same level as young people from other parts of the world, the medals and diplomas they achieve in this framework are doubly meritorious, although it is a sad consolation for all of us.

Returning to Faustino, he has enormous merits and potential, recently he won a game in the blitz mode against none other than Magnus Carlsen and last week he finished in third position in a contest under the same mode called Titled Tuesday with 9.5 points out of 11, ahead of the world champion himself Magnus Carlsen, the number 2 American in the ranking Fabiano Caruana and Hikaru Nakamura, number 3 in the ranking and also of North American nationality.

What I see here is enormous pressure on the figure of the child and his parents and coaches should be very careful about how they are carrying him, it would not be the first time that the pressure and the development of skipped stages throw overboard a career that promises be brilliant, we have seen it too many times in other sports. He is a prodigy, but also a child.

In any case, we are far from knowing both his personality and the tasks carried out to guide and develop him in this environment, let's wait to see what happens and in the meantime, all chess lovers, let's enjoy his talent.