What’s next for Oshini Gunawardhana?

 

The Sri Lankan chess community has known Oshini Gunawardhana for several years. She was clearly a star in ascendancy from the time she won gold at the World Youth Chess Championship in 2021. In 2024 she became the youngest ever National Women’s Champion. Today she’s the highest rated player in the world among girls under 13 years of age and is tanked 42nd among junior girls in the world, the first time a Sri Lankan player has broken into the top 50.  

She is highly talented and probably a tireless student of the game, for talent alone can only take you so far. So the question is, what’s next? 

There are titles to be secured of course: WGM (Woman Grand Master) and GM (Grand Master). Dare we speak of something even greater, for example Women’s World Champion?  We should, for she can do it. But only if she gets the opportunity to take part in strong international tournaments.

Oshini will probably shine in age group tournaments in Western Asia, Asia and the World event as well. Typically, however, she will get to test her skills against only a handful of strong players, i.e. those with higher ratings. She’ll have podium finishes, no doubt, but is that enough? No. Not for someone with so much promise and who puts in hours and hours of hard work to develop her game.

Oshini is not just the standard bearer of Sri Lanka chess; if she reaches her full potential one can rest assured that this fact alone will spur others to emulate her achievements. Chess in Sri Lanka can go into overdrive both in terms of interest in the game (measurable by numbers) and qualitative leap in playing strength.

That’s how India became a chess powerhouse. One player. One iconic player. He conquered the world on his own and in a quarter of a century India won gold in the Open and Women’s sections at the Chess Olympiad.  

For decades chess was a game mostly associated with Russia and of course the Soviet Union. The number of world champions and grandmasters was simply mind boggling. India was not on the chess world map. Not until Viswanathan ‘Vishy’ Anand emerged in the mid 1990s. Today India is a chess powerhouse. The current world champ is Domnaraju Gukesh. India won golds at the last Chess Olympiad, i.e. in the Open and Women’s events, as mentioned above.. There are several Indians who are legitimate contenders for the world chess crown in both categories. India has arrived and not just yesterday.

How did this happen? Vishy was the obvious catalyst, even before he became World Champion in for the first time 2000. His achievements not only ignited enthusiasm for chess in India but spurred several generations of young Indians to dedicate themselves to reaching similar heights. Slowly but surely a critical mass of strong players emerged in India.  

That was not all, Vishy’s success convinced parents that chess was a worthy pursuit. National pride came to be associated with the game (and not just cricket).  All of this helped develop a strong ecosystem of training. Chess academies sprouted, especially in Chennai, Mumbai, Delhi and Bangalore. In time, Indian youngsters embraced wholeheartedly online platforms that helped them master the key aspects of the game. For all this, the critical factor was Indian players traveling in Europe to play in strong tournaments. Even today, the vast majority of Indian Grandmasters have secured their title norms abroad.

How about Sri Lanka?

Well, Sri Lanka is yet to produce a World Champion, although we have young players who have achieved podium finishes in regional tournaments and in some cases on the world stage. This is in age-group events. Sri Lanka’s chess ecosystem is far better than India’s at the time Vishy began his long march towards world domination.

In terms of numbers, the percentage of school children who play tournaments is the best in the region. Even the youngest players are familiar with online platforms such as ChessBase, chess.com and lichens.org. They dig deep into the relevant data bases and spend hours working on their game without compromising their regular study schedule.

What Sri Lanka lacks is a Vishy Anand. Oshini is not a Vishy Anand, at least not yet. But she can be.

Oshini, like other talented players around her age like Vinuka Wijeratne, Thehas Kiringoda and Chenitha Karunaratne, needs support. If, for example, all four players get to play in a series of strong tournaments in Europe over the course of 4-6 weeks, their will improve exponentially.

Yes, it costs. But then again each of these players by the fact of their sheer playing strength, has what it takes to be an excellent ambassador, be it for a corporate brand or for Sri Lanka.

Vishy was a catalyst. Oshini can be one too. So too Vinuka, Chenitha and Thehas. As individuals or as a team, they can continue bring glory to Sri Lanka.

Several decades from now, long after I am dead and gone, someone talking of chess in Sri Lanka might say, ‘we are number one in the world, but it all began with a little girl from Ratnapura named Oshini.’  Put another way, if Sri Lanka ever becomes a chess powerhouse (and this is possible!), we will all owe much to the likes of Oshini. We will bask in reflected glory.  

For that, however, we need to back her to the hilt, not just with good wishes, but by enabling her to take part in the tournaments that will make our little champion shine brighter in the chess firmament.  

Let’s do it.

[This article was published in the Daily News under the weekly column title 'The Recurrent Thursday']