The rest I disagree. There will be even less sponsors if FIDE changes the rules in the middle of the competition. Not to mention that it is unfair to all the GP partticipants, and also probably illegal (or at least it should be). Besides how exactly does this “new” cycle take care of the problems with Grand Prix??? It will still be played, only that it will be even harder to get sponsors since the Grand Prix has been demoted for one stage.

When the 2008-2010/11 cycle was announced I really liked it. It is a mixture of all systems we had before – tournaments (Grand Prix), knock-out (World Cup) and matches (challenger match and WCC match) – so I think everybody should be satisfied with it (there just isn’t any perfect system). The one who comes on top can trully be considered as a World Champion since he proved his superiority regardless of the competition system.

So I think the system is OK, what chess world needs is stability! A system that will be used for years. It’s those constant changes that are killing the World Championship, not the competition sytem.

It’s as if the top players think they’re doing the world a “favor” by playing these top-level chess events. Should we forget the hundreds of thousands of euros they are loading into their bank account over the course of the year? No, they are not doing a favor to the world by playing, ultimately they are the ones who are benefitting. They can pull out of an event if they’d like, it’s one less whiner! Ideally it would be nice if the GP could stay as it was, but if sponsors pull out and there is no money, what do the players expect FIDE to do? Make money out of air?

FIDE and other organizations have a tough time raising funds for a “sport” like chess because it simply is not an easy task… chess is not football.

The players should step down from the skies and realize that they are making money by playing this game, and they should not be so picky if an organization like FIDE has to change rules to make sure the event can survive when sponsors pull out.

The GP was compromised when the Doha and Montreaux legs got pulled out so FIDE _HAD TO_ make changes to the qualification process to account for the damage that the changes to the GP process would have caused…

If the players are worried about qualifying under the new 8-player system, maybe they should get better at playing. If they really think they are worthy of qualifying, then they should theoretically win in the 8-player system, otherwise if they can’t win when facing 7 other competitors, what makes them worthy of being a challenger to the world champion? Otherwise, if they fear losing in an 8-player game, they are merely a pretender to the throne, then that is why they would be concerned by the changes to the qualification.

[I apologize if this seems very harsh on the players, but chess is a game and the players should not forget the difficulty in raising money for a game as difficult to market as this one is.]

Add to the winners of this the winner of the world cup and some high rated players (the hghest possible off course) and you have a system that can work because those tournaments have a sound organisational platform.