Tue, Feb 09 2010

Private sponsors to cover costs of chess crown showdown in Sofia

Thu, Nov 26 2009 13:48 CET 1981 Views
Private sponsors to cover costs of chess crown showdown in Sofia

Photo: Nadezhda Chipeva

The three million euro needed for the organisation of the April 5-25 2010 showdown for the world chess crown in Sofia between Bulgarian challenger Vesselin Topalov and India's defending champion Viswanathan Anand, will be covered by sponsors.

"Bulgarian Chess Federation is in talks with about 40 companies, a large part of whom would say yes to sponsoring the event," Bulgarian-language Dnevnik daily quoted Stefan Sergiev, head of the Bulgarian Chess Federation as saying on November 25 2009..

"For now I can not give any more details as the sponsorship contract hasn't been signed yet. I expect this to happen in the middle of December, when the president of the World Chess Federation (FIDE), Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, will come to Bulgaria" Sergiev said.

That is when Bulgaria would know if the match would make a profit, he said, because Bulgaria was yet to negotiate the commercial rights of the match with FIDE.

"It is absurd that although we are hosting and organising the event, we still have to negotiate the commercial rights with FIDE and after that start selling TV rights," Sergiev said.

There was no point in Bulgaria paying for the commercial rights and this would be Bulgaria's position during the talks with FIDE, he said.

Sergiev said that although the Bulgarian state would not be directly involved in financing the match, Prime Minister Boiko Borissov was very active in finding sponsors. Borissov had previously promised the Government's support for organising the match and was even made the chairperson of the organisation committee.

Sofia's bid to host the event offered to spend three million euro on organising the event and a further two million euro in prize money. FIDE picked Sofia over Turkey and Singapore.

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Sofia to host world chess crown showdown in April 2010

Sofia was picked to host the showdown for the world chess crown, giving Bulgarian challenger Vesselin Topalov the home ground advantage against India's Viswanathan Anand.

Sofia bids to host Topalov-Anand chess crown match in April 2010

The winner city will be decided by October 9, with Bulgaria facing competition from Turkey and Singapore so far

Sofia wants to host world chess crown showdown between Topalov, Anand

Prime Minister Boiko Borissov says the state could cover the six million leva cost so that Topalov can play at home

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