What if sportspeople played chess?

Hello everyone, welcome back to your favorite series on the internet, and we are back with another edition of the unseen najdorf. Being a little late to the schedule because of some health issues, I decided to continue down the road of fashion in which we went last time, famous sportspeople, and what openings would they play. Later on, we can also take this idea to another genre. So before I get into this blog, let me explain what I am trying to rank in today's blog.

Basically, we are going to, just like one of our previous blogs, take famous sportspeople (one from each sport), and think that if they were a chess player,

what would be their preferred opening. This time we are imagining them as white, so we are going to be looking at openings only. So if you guys understood what I am talking about, without further ado, lets get into this!

Table Of Contents

• Tennis
• Cricket
• Football
• Bonus: Game

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  Tennis

For Tennis, I chose none other than the newly retired Rafael Nadal. Being one of the most top Tennis players for over a decade, having formed a strikingly sharp rivalry with Roger Federer, which was then bettered by the entry of Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal goes down in history as one of the greatest Tennis players of all time. Nadal has won 22 Grand Slam singles titles, including a record 14 French Open titles (Roland Garros), showcasing his dominance on clay courts.
He is one of the few players to achieve a Career Grand Slam, winning each of the four majors (Australian Open, French Open, Wimbledon, and US Open) at least once.
He won the gold medal in men's singles at the 2008 Beijing Olympics and also played a key role in Spain's Davis Cup victories.

So, after all this, I decided to go with

The Italian Game

I had to choose this opening because of its slow, positional dominance play. The Italian game is a king's pawn opening, in which black and white basically try to control the e pawn, try to be symmetrical, and white targets the weak f pawn. I decided to choose this because Rafa loves clay courts, and clay courts are known for their slow, and positional advantage accorinding to your strokeplay compared to hard or grass courts. So the Italian Game fits perfectly.

Cricket

Guess who it is... None other than Baz.

Brendon Mccullum, born in Dunedin, Otago, New Zealand, he rose quickly through the ranks of cricket in New Zealand and made his debut for New Zealand in all three formats during 2002. He was appointed Captain of the test team in 2013, which during the final years of his playing the sport sparked a revolution in kiwi cricket, marked by the characteristic of fearless and aggressive style of play. This style oozed with class and flamboyant strokeplaying, coupled with amazing fielding, led New Zealand to their first ever world cup final in 2015. After that he took up coaching and took up the role of the England's men national team in tests, which resulted in its own revolution.

So the opening I chose was

The Ruy Lopez Opening

Instead of going down the normal route and choosing a striker, I decided to choose a midfielder, you'll see why. Frank Lampard is regarded as one of the greatest players to have ever played for his club, Chelsea and probably regarded as one of the best players to have ever played for his generation. 

Achievements:
Chelsea Career: Lampard spent 13 years at Chelsea (2001-2014), becoming the club's all-time leading goalscorer with 211 goals
Trophies Won:  Lampard helped the club win numerous titles, including:

3 Premier League titles (2004-05, 2005-06, 2014-15)
4 FA Cups (2006-07, 2008-09, 2011-12, 2017-18)
2 League Cups (2004-05, 2006-07)
1 UEFA Champions League (2011-12)
1 UEFA Europa League (2012-13)
International Career: Lampard earned 106 caps for the England national team and played in multiple major tournaments, including three FIFA World Cups and two UEFA European Championships.
Individual Honors: He received numerous individual accolades throughout his career, including being named the FWA Footballer of the Year in 2005 and the PFA Players' Player of the Year in 2006. He was also included in the PFA Team of the Year multiple times.

So I have decided to go with...

The English Opening

The English opening is an extremely flexible opening, just like a midfielder. It is a flank opening, and it looks to control the center just like the sicilian by the flank. This allows in passive-aggressive play which can result in exciting encounters with the black side. In addition, this can also transpose into other different openings, such as the slav, grunfield, kings indian, and much more. But I would add the english here because its a versatile and flank opening.