After six rounds of the 46th Chess Olympiad, both Turkmenistan teams have moved into the top 30 of the standings, well above their pre-tournament seeding.
The Turkmenistan men’s team is 25th out of 206 teams, while the women’s team is 26th out of 190. The men entered the tournament as the No. 65 seed and the women as No. 55. Both teams have scored 9 match points from a possible 12 and remained unbeaten in their last two rounds against opponents seeded significantly higher.
Men: a big win over Denmark and a draw with Slovakia
In Round 5 on 20 September, Turkmenistan drew 2–2 with Slovakia, the No. 38 seed.
Grandmaster Meylis Annaberdiev (2,384) defeated grandmaster Peter Michalik (2,543). Grandmaster Saparmurat Atabayev (2,503) and FIDE Master Amanmuhammed Hommadov (2,389) drew with grandmaster Jergus Pechac (2,538) and International Master Samir Sahidi (2,478), respectively. Shahrukh Turaev (2,222) lost to grandmaster Juraj Druska (2,459).
Turkmenistan then produced one of its strongest results of the tournament in Round 6, beating Denmark 3½–½ on 21 September. Atabayev held grandmaster Jonas Bjerre (2,615) to a draw, while Annaberdiev defeated grandmaster Jesper Thybo (2,579), Hommadov beat grandmaster Bjorn Oksner (2,478), and Vepaly Halyniazov (2,257) defeated International Master Filip Olsen (2,453).
Annaberdiev has scored 4½ points from five games, including four consecutive wins, giving him a tournament performance rating of 2,788. Halyniazov has won all three of his games, with a performance rating of 2,865, while Hommadov has scored 4½ points from six games. The team is captained by Turkmenistan’s honoured coach Serdar Annaberdiev.
Women: wins over Argentina and a draw with Spain
The Turkmenistan women’s team defeated Argentina 2½–1½ in Round 5. FIDE Master Jahan Rejepova (2,027) beat Woman International Master Anapaola Borda Rodas (2,204), while Myahri Agamuradova (1,939) defeated Woman International Master Anna Laura Scarzi (2,212). Woman FIDE Master Lala Shohradova (2,147) drew with Woman Grandmaster Candela Francisco Geva (2,268), while Woman FIDE Master Leyla Shohradova (2,101) lost to Woman International Master Maria Jose Campos (2,230).
In Round 6, Turkmenistan drew 2–2 with Spain, the No. 19 seed. All four Spanish players hold either International Master or Woman Grandmaster titles.
Lala Shohradova drew with International Master Marta Garcia Martin (2,349), while Leyla Shohradova shared the point with International Master Sabrina Vega Gutierrez (2,363), a silver medallist on Spain’s third board at the 2024 Olympiad.
Agamuradova recorded her third consecutive win over a titled opponent, defeating Woman Grandmaster Monika Calzetta Ruiz (2,181). Rejepova lost to International Master Ana Matnadze (2,302).
Agamuradova has emerged as one of Turkmenistan’s standout performers in Samarkand, scoring 4½ points from five games with a performance rating of 2,382 and gaining more than 100 rating points.
The women’s team is coached at the Olympiad by Mergen Kakabaev, Secretary General of the Chess Federation of Turkmenistan.
“Our teams’ performance can almost be described as a sensation. The standings show that teams with a similar starting seed to ours are much lower down the table. But none of our players is taking the results for granted; they are focused on building on what we have achieved,” Kakabaev said.
From early setbacks to a place in the top 30
Both Turkmenistan teams opened the Olympiad with 4–0 victories, against Timor-Leste and Liechtenstein respectively. They then lost in Round 2 to Serbia and Poland.
Since then, however, both teams have gone unbeaten. The men won their third- and fourth-round matches and collected 3½ points from four games in Rounds 5 and 6. The women won their third, fourth and fifth-round matches before holding Spain to a draw.
In Samarkand, both Turkmenistan teams are competing in rating Category B.
At the 2024 Olympiad in Budapest, they recorded the best results in their history in their respective categories: the men won Category B, while the women won Category C. Their objective in Samarkand is to repeat that achievement by finishing first in their categories, while also giving players an opportunity to achieve International Master norms and improve their individual ratings.
Their final stage of preparation consisted of a two-week training camp led by International Grandmaster Alexander Rakhmanov, organised in cooperation with the Chess Federation of Kazakhstan under its Freedom Asian Chess Initiatives (FACI) programme.
What comes next
After the rest day on 23 September, both teams return to action in Round 7 at 3 p.m. Samarkand time.
The men will face Austria, the No. 27 seed, led by grandmaster Kirill Alekseenko (2,656). The women will take on England, seeded No. 20. England’s first board features the highly rated 11-year-old Bodhana Sivanandan (2,354), who has attracted considerable attention in the chess world at an exceptionally young age.
Five rounds remain. The 11th and final round, followed by the closing ceremony, is scheduled for 27 September.
Full results and games involving Turkmenistan’s teams are available on Chess-Results: Open tournament results and Women’s tournament results. ///Chess Federation of Turkmenistan