How fare our juniors?

In year 2010 I mentioned our most promising juniors that impressed me were  Yeoh Li Tian, Mohd Nabil , Sumant Subramaniam, Tan Jun Feng , Low Jun Jian and Fong Yit San and Mark Siew. Now in 2012 I can  review their progress since I made that statement.

Yeoh Li Tian has progressed the most having broken the 2200 FIDE rating barrier in the latest rating list. He is now in the top 10 in Malaysia by rating. The next best is Sumant who is rated 2074 and represented Malaysia in the 2011 SEA Games. Mohd Nabil is ELO 2054  and won the last National Junior while Mark Siew only came in fifth.

Li Tian, Sumant and Nabil can be considered to have achieved something since 2010 while the rest have not lived up to (my) expectations although both Tan Jun Feng and Fong Yit San did qualify for the SEA Games selection event.

Li Tian's target for this year should be to qualify for the Olympiad Team. It is not going to be easy with IM Lim Yee Weng getting an automatic place and IM Mas the hot favourite to grab another. This leaves only three more places.

Incidentally, Li Tian is entered for the Brunei Campomanes Open in April. This will be a real testing ground for the boy with many grandmasters and international masters taking part. Both Fong brothers , Yit Ho and Yit San are also taking part. Hopefully they can make some impact too.

I have been following another junior , Aron Teh Eu Wen, since the 2011 National Championship. I met this boy over the board in the very first round. He handled the white side of a Benko Gambit very well and I had to offer a draw as I was a pawn down and with less time. I thought he is talented, I had a chat with his mother. They are based in China (not sure if he receives training from the Chinese coaches).

Since then he has been collecting rating points from every tournament he played. In the last National Junior he placed third defeating Mark Siew in the last round.

This year he has played in the Aeroflot Open (gained 46.8 points), 2nd HD Bank Open (gained 25.35 points) in Vietnam, defeating  WIM Nguyen Thi Mai Hung (Vietnam's representative in 2011 SEA Games) in the last round. The lastest rating list has him at 1900. This is another boy to watch.

Actually I had wrote this post yesterday and scheduled it to be published tonight, so I was kind of beaten to the finish line by Peter Long who also wrote something about our juniors here. Synchronicity at work?