Final yr an e-mail landed within the inboxes of three of India’s prime prodigies — D Gukesh, R Praggnanandhaa and Arjun Erigaisi — asking them a query that they by no means needed to reply earlier than. The crew administration of the Alpine SG Pipers needed to know what they want their jersey numbers to be.
On the International Chess League, a number of the world’s finest gamers have needed to confront the jersey quantity query a lot earlier than they get to different vexing questions over the chess board.
Praggnanandhaa contemplated the query for some time and determined he needed No 10. It was not solely his date of beginning but additionally the quantity that legendary athletes like Sachin Tendulkar and Lionel Messi had sported on the again of their jerseys.
However another person on his crew had the identical thought.
“I replied to the e-mail about seven hours later. However Gukesh had replied earlier asking for No 10. So ultimately, final time I ended up with No 7. It’s what Cristiano Ronaldo and MS Dhoni wore. And final season labored out properly for me. So this time I picked the identical quantity once more,” Pragg tells The Indian Specific with a smile.
5-time world champion Viswanathan Anand had it simple for his selection. However there have been loads of questions on the choose, No 64.
“64 has develop into sort of my factor. Vishy64TheKing is my Twitter deal with. It’s develop into an everlasting joke,” Ganges Grandmasters’ icon participant Anand tells The Indian Specific. “However folks see it and ask me ‘Oh have been you born in 1964?’ I’ve to inform them that I used to be born in 1969 however 64 is what number of squares there are on the chessboard!”
And identical to Pragg, American Gambits icon star Hikaru Nakamura additionally was denied his preliminary choose for the quantity on his again.
“I didn’t choose my quantity. I mainly picked No 1 or No 5. They didn’t have it. So I simply advised them to choose one!” shrugs the World No 2 who additionally wears the No 2 jersey.
Vidit Gujrathi, too, was denied his choose of No 4 as a result of another person had obtained there earlier than him. He smiles as he says he won’t reveal why he needed No 4 however provides: “When that was not obtainable, I picked No 1. Levon Aronian (taking part in for Triveni Continental Kings) picked it final time they usually gained the match. So I took that as properly.”
Sachin and Dhoni should not the one cricketers who’ve made it simpler for gamers on the GCL to resolve their jersey numbers. Present India captain Rohit Sharma’s jersey quantity 45 additionally discovered a taker in upGrad Mumba Masters’ Raunak Sadhwani, who says the Mumbai cricketer is his favorite, which made him choose the jersey quantity as properly.
Confronted by a query that they not often ever face in a sport the place they principally play in enterprise fits, some have picked numbers which have particular which means for them.
Harika Dronavalli, who led the Indian ladies’s crew to the gold medal on the recently-concluded Chess Olympiad in Budapest, says when she was requested to choose a jersey quantity, she was dumbfounded initially, Then she ended up selecting her daughter’s birthdate — 24 — as a result of it was the one quantity that got here in her thoughts. She had, after all, competed within the earlier Olympiad whereas pregnant.
Ganges Grandmasters’ Arjun Erigaisi picked No 3 as a result of he was born on September 3, 2003.
PBG Alaskan Knights Nihal Sarin confesses he had no position in selecting the quantity on his again: 13. Whereas the remainder of the world would possibly take into account it unfortunate, Nihal chuckles: “My supervisor selected it as a result of I used to be born on July 13. I do know it’s thought of unfortunate. However I’m hoping to vary that.”