Topalov: "I don?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢t see a reason there should be any changes"

According to the world's number one player, the current world championship cycle shouldn't be changed, at least not until 2011. In a special press conference held on the last rest day of the Olympiad, Veselin Topalov shared his opinion on several subjects with the present media.

Besides talking about the results of the Bulgarian team (which actually played just 7 draws in 40 games!), his own winning streak that was halted by Shirov, and his success at San Luis in 2005, of course yesterday Topalov was also asked about his upcoming match against Gata Kamsky.

He thought the first time they met at the chess board was at Las Palmas '94 (a game that was drawn) but actually earlier that year in Linares they already played (a game that also ended in a draw). The score since '94 is four draws and four wins for Topalov.

Here are some excerpts from the press conference about Topalov's upcoming match against Kamsky, about the Olympiad and about the World Championship cycle:

About Kamsky's style and why his future opponent did he so well in matches:

"His style is quite universal, many games with attacks, good endgames, manoeuvering... Hard to say what is his strongest point. In his matches he was motivated, young, he had a lot of energy and strong nerves. He had bad luck at some point when he just played too many matches; I'm talking about the period before 1996."

About withdrawing from Linares:

"Of course I was not so happy at all to withdraw because in general I always keep my contracts. (...) Everyone would understand that the world championship cycle, this match, is more important than Linares and I'm really sorry and I believe that the organizers would understand."

About whether playing on home ground is an advantage:

It depends; I don't really know. Of course from one side you have the pressure, but you also have the support. In general, when you play well it's better to play at home because everybody is saying bravo but when it goes wrong it's terrible. It depends on the result."

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Watch the full press conference:

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About the new rules at the Olympiad:

"For me it's more or less the same because it doesn't really change my game. As for the delay; there should be really strict rules, but I think there should be a financial fine; this is very efficient. The 30-move is nothing new for me. In general I think there should be the same rules for all players so that's good."

About the system of the world championship (commenting on the Nunn proposal which according to Chessbase is seriously considered by FIDE officials, despite the fact that it was promised quite clearly by FIDE that the cycle wouldn't be changed again):

"I don't think there's a perfect system. There are for me three systems: knockout is OK, a tournament is OK, and a match system is also OK. But once we have this cycle, I think it has to be finished. What FIDE should do is run the cycle they signed, they promised, and then change, if they want to. But you cannot change every two months, you know, because players make plans. This is basically what they have to do. I guess they just have to run the tournaments and then to have the winner of the Grand Prix 2009, World Cup, a match, and then challenge the world champion. I think this is what they have to do, and they promised. And then OK, after 2011 maybe some changes, but I don't see a reason now there should be any new changes. (...) The worst thing you can do is change the rules during the same cycle, like already happened many times."