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Sunday, 13 April 2008 |
 As a Baku citizen, for Teimour Radjabov it must be a joy to be able to play such a strong and important tournament "just around the corner." It remains to be seen whether it will help him to start with a good score in this first FIDE Grand Prix Series, but his home crowd will definitely boost his ambition.
Radjabov was born in Baku – just like former World Champion Garry Kasparov – on March 12, 1987. At the 2003 Linares chess tournament, Radjabov, at 15, famously defeated Kasparov with the black pieces. But he had acquired world fame before, earning the title of International Grandmaster in March 2001 at the age of 14, making him the second-youngest Grandmaster in history at the time.
Radjabov reached the semi-finals (earning a bronze medal) at the FIDE World Chess Championship 2004. At the Morelia/Linares tournament in 2006, Radjabov finished second. Later that year, Radjabov challenged the winner of the Topalov-Kramnik World Championship match, as was the right of every 2700 rated player according to FIDE rules, but a match with Kramnik was never played.
One of his biggest successes to date is Radjabov's victory (joint with Aronian and Topalov) at the Corus Chess Tournament in Wijk aan Zee in 2007. A month later he made the news when he had to withdraw from the Morelia/Linares tournament after his laptop was stolen just after he had arrrived in Mexico.
At this year's Corus tournament, Radjabov had another excellent performance, finishing shared 3rd together with World Champion Vishy Anand. Before that Radjabov had won the second World Rapid Cup in Odessa, Ukraine, early January.
21-year-old Radjabov has impressed his international fans more than once by answering journalists in almost fluent English, and with an amazing speed. To sketch Radjabov's playing style it's enough to tell that he's almost single-handedly responsible for the current rivial of the King's Indian Defence.
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