The new Bundesliga season started with a setback for us. With one 3:5 defeat our first team returns from the away game at Hamburger SK – a challenge in the fight to defend the title, and also an experience that we haven’t had for more than a year and a half. We last lost in the Bundesliga in March 2023 and finished last season with a perfect 30-0 points.
Nevertheless, team boss Stefan Martin was not surprised. He feared that this would happen, says Stefan, looking at our line-up, in which the first six of the squad were missing. The Global Chess League in London, which runs parallel to the Bundesliga, signed up almost the entire chess elite early on, including our best players. The OSG Baden-Baden was also affected.
Because of the looming personnel shortage, not only here, we would have liked to have postponed the first day of the double match completely, but the other teams didn’t follow suit. Moving our own opener separately failed due to the lack of consent from our opponents. Stefan predicts that the Bundesliga clubs will face further collisions with top international events over the course of the season.
Even without the top six, we have a strong team that should be able to cause problems for most opponents. Against Hamburg, reinforced by returnee Niclas Huschenbeth and new signing Leonardo Costa, we were even nominally slightly favored. But it wasn’t meant to be that day.
Konstantin Tarlev’s attempts to attack under a pawn sacrifice were bounced back and our new signing Yagiz Kaan Erdogmus had his back to the wall from the opening. Soon there were two games going against us, and in the six others only Dennis Wagner came close to having a chance of winning. From a sporting point of view, the defeat was smooth and deserved. David Anton’s attitude is supported by the fact that with the score at 2.5:4.5 in a slightly better women’s final he tried to make the end result of the long-decided fight more lenient for us.
Hamburg against Viernheim in the clubhouse of the Hamburger SK, which the Hanseatic League made into a Bundesliga game room after their travel partner Kiel withdrew. | Photo: Stefan Spiegel
It wasn’t good in terms of sport, but we still see bright spots. Getting to know our new additions Aravindh Chithambaram and Yagiz Kaan Erdogmus went harmoniously. Both fit in straight away and both will contribute to the Viernheim team spirit over the course of the series, which has given us many an extra point in recent months.
Stefan Spiegel used the hours before the start of the competition to talk to our newcomers about the meaning and pronunciation of their names. In Viernheim we now pronounce “Erdogmus” (with a silent “g”!) almost like native speakers, but we still have a hard time with “Yagiz”. But we are working on it.
Regarding “Aravindh”, the first and last name issue was up for debate. Stefan explains: “Aravindh is the last name for the chess world, but at the same time it is also the first name for the friendly address.” So for us: just “Aravindh”.
Over the coming months there will be plenty of opportunity to delve deeper into these topics. But for now the most important thing is: points are a must. On November 30th we face FC St. Pauli in Heimbach and Werder Bremen on December 1st.
