The champion's 'band of brothers'

CHENNAI: Getting the right team is one of the most difficult tasks in top-level chess, especially if you are playing a World Championship.
Viswanathan Anand's team of seconds in his last three World Championship contests has played a crucial role in defining his success and the world champion will be the first to admit that his effort in finding them was equally tough.Anand fondly called his team — Peter Heine-Nielsen of Denmark, Indian GM Surya Sekhar Ganguly, Polish GM Radoslav Wojtasek and former world champion Rustam Kasimdzhanov of Uzbekistan — his 'band of brothers.'
It took him a lot of time and struggle to find his partnerscum-trainers when he was coming up the ladder. But by the time he found them , the matchplay had disappeared from WCC. "Match preparation has changed a lot since computers became vital to training. That means you have a lot more information and precise analysis that you either know or don't know," Anand told TOI.
For a young Grandmaster qualifying for the World Championship from India, it was a herculean task to get someone reliable and useful to work with him.
As Anand was already a potential threat to the Soviets, it was risky if he had to depend on their trainers, though they were the most experienced in the area of coaching and training. First, he had Ferdinand Hellers (Sweden ) as help against Alexei Dreev, but by the time he was to meet Anatoly Karpov (1991 ), he needed serious preparation.
"In my match against Karpov, finding (Mikhail ) Gurevich was tough. But that was very useful to me ... that was the first time I sat and studied chess and took preparation seriously," recalls Anand.
Gurevich had helped Kasparov and Anand's association with him was only for the Karpov match. It was not until 1995 when he had his big match against Kasparov. The Indian had come to grips with the western GMs and slowly he started getting an idea about the ruthless professional world.
"For Kasparov (in 1995 ), I had a good team but I guess I was very naive in my approach," admits Anand. "By 2008 (against Kramnik ) I was a more mature player," he said.
His team is now a well-oiled unit, like the army of seconds that Kasparov had in the 1990s.