Ruelle Canino battles world and European champion WGM Anna Shukhman in first round of World Cup

FILIPINA dynamo Ruelle Canino sets out as the country’s biblical David against the planet’s Goliaths of the sport as she battles Woman Grandmaster (WGM) Anna Shukhman in the first round of the Women’s Chess World Cup that unfurled on Sunday night in Batumi, Georgia.

Ms. Canino, 17, practically flew to the Georgian capital as an underdog after having been ranked 102^nd of the 107 participants with a FIDE rating of 2004.

Russians Aleksandra Goryachkina and Alexandra Kosteniuk head the ultra competitive field after they topped the last two editions of this biennial meet in 2021 in Sochi, Russia and 2023 in Baku, Azerbaijan, respectively.

The Cagayan de Oro lass is a year older than Ms. Shukhman, a Russian representing the FIDE refugee flag, but the reigning world and European champion should be the favorite with a 27^th-ranked rating of 2413.

They will play two games of standard time control.

Ties will be broken by two-game rapid time control, and if it’s tied again match after match, will be subsequently resolved by two games of blitz and, finally, a one-game Armageddon duel.

It will be a difficult path to glory for Ms. Canino as the tournament will implement a seven-round knockout format with the eventual top three finishers gaining outright spots to next year’s Women’s Candidates Matches.

Despite the overwhelming odds, Ms. Canino had shown she can bring down the best of them after having slew two WGMs in Argentine Claudia Amura and Romanian Carmen Voicu-Jagodzinsky in last year’s Budapest Olympiad where the country snared a historic Group B gold.

And that gives Ms. Canino hope. — Joey Villar