CREDIT: Mike Klein via Twitter
This is probably the most bizarre game of chess that we have seen. What on earth is going on in Gibraltar. In the last round Women’s World Chess Champion Hou Yifan lost in just 5 moves.
According to the Chess24 Facebook page, after 25 minutes Hou Yifan played 1.g4 (this is the Grob opening), then 2.f3, then resigned on move 5! #Chess. Is this a protest of some sort? #GibChess
There is surely no way that a player of Hou Yifan’s calibre could play such poor chess. There must be something else at play here. Hopefully we will find out soon enough. Something is going on in Gibraltar and we hope to find out what exactly. We have never seen anything like this before!
Below is an extract of Hou Yifan’s bio on Wikipedia:
Hou Yifan (born 27 February 1994, Xinghua, Jiangsu, China) is a Chinese chess grandmaster and former chess prodigy. She is the current Women’s World Chess Champion, the youngest ever to win the title, as well as the youngest female player ever to qualify for the title of Grandmaster.
Update: According to @FollowChess on Twitter, Hou Yifan was clearly upset about something that she attempted to get mated in the shortest moves with g4-f3.
According to the tweets we are seeing, Yifan was reportedly upset at playing so many women at Gibraltar Chess.
Here is the interview given by Hou Yifan after her game.