The 15th World Champion has a lot to play for

In less than a week, the FIDE, the governing body of chess around the world, will crown its 15th World Champion. The choice has been narrowed down to Vishwanathan Anand and Alexei Shirov, both of whom spend a better part if the year in salubrious Spain.

As the championships near their end, the question that is now uppermost in all minds, is will there be a re-unification match between the champion crowned here in Tehran and Vladimir Kramnik. The latter recently beat Garry Kasparov, in a match which the FIDE chooses to treat as a 'private' match, which had no nothing to do with the World Championships.

In a press conference here before the final, the FIDE president Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, ruled out any unification match. "There was the fourteenth World Champion, Alexander Khalifman, the fifteenth will come out in a week" said Ilyumzhinov.

The NIIT-sponsored Anand and Shirov, who some years ago shifted from the former Soviet Union to the chess-friendly Spain, are being seen as ideal ambassadors for the sport. In fact it was this very fact that prompted the FIDE to organize an exhibition tie between the two at the Sydney Olympics earlier this year. They played two games and the match ended 1-1.

But Ilyumzhinov did indicate that there could be a World Prestige Match between the current world champion one who will be crowned in Tehran and Kramnik. But he chose not to commit on whether the FIDE would undertake the responsibility of organizing the match and arranging for sponsorship and prize money. He said various possibilities would be looked into.

The 'Prestige' match, Ilyumzhinov indicated could be done in co-ordination with the next International Olympic Committee session. The discussion on inclusion of chess in the Olympics is to be discussed at the next IOC session in Moscow. The venue, the prize money and the modalities will be discussed later.

Also present at the Press Conference was the president of the Iran Chess Federation Mohamed Djaffar Kambouzia.

For the present, the most important event is the FIDE World Championships in Tehran. In the past there have been debates on whether the strongest players were fighting for the title. Kasparov has stayed away from the Championships ever since it started, but this time Kramnik stayed. The absence of former world champion Anatoly Karpov, whose playing strength has dropped, has not created much of discussion.

This year's Championship in Delhi brought in rave reviews from all over the world. In fact even Kasparov has admitted in his columns on his site that the games have been of high quality. He has also said that the two best players have reached the final.

Many read these utterances of Kasparov as an indication that he is realizing it is futile to organize one-off matches for a perceived world title. The Professional Chess Association, which had a full cycle culminating in a match between Kasparov and Anand in 1995, is no longer around.

Kasparov organized 'title' matches with Nigel Short and more recently with Kramnik. The matches did create hype but nobody knows how to react to a match, where the challenger was almost handpicked.

The world champion in the current FIDE Knock Out championships is going to be the most accepted one and both Kasparov and Kramnik would have little option but to accept it.

And even if Kasparov continues to be on his own, critics feel that Kramnik, though he is very close to Kasparov, will come back into the FIDE fold at some point of time.