Chess - a stepping stone for young talent

The story of joining hands to support young talents, including chess, will never go out of date. In which, the success of chess players always comes from the creation of conditions and the cooperation of many parties.

From the historical world medal

In mid-May 2025, an award ceremony took place in Son Tay town, Hanoi, which included an exchange with the awardees. That day, two people who came on stage to exchange were midfielder Doan Ngoc Tan (Thanh Hoa Club) and young player Nguyen Xuan Phuong. Doan Ngoc Tan has become famous, especially after his excellent performance at the AFF Cup 2024. This midfielder was born in Son Tay and of course became the pride of the sports town where he was born.

The previous generation had Doan Ngoc Tan, the next generation of this town's sports has a 10-year-old young chess player Nguyen Xuan Phuong. In April 2024, this player won a bronze medal in the U10 blitz chess individual event at the 2025 World Youth Rapid and Blitz Chess Championship. For many other localities, a world youth bronze medal may not be too big, but for Son Tay, it is a special event.

To win this world medal, many parties joined hands. As experts in the profession commented, the U10 World Blitz Chess Bronze Medal of player Nguyen Xuan Phuong is a highlight of the coordination in discovering and training young talents between the sports sector of Hanoi city and localities in the city, in addition to the companionship of the family.

Chess player Nguyen Xuan Phuong (right) receives the award at the 2025 World Youth Rapid and Blitz Chess Championship.

Regarding the historic world medal in sports of this town, we must mention the meeting about 3 years ago between the Director of Hanoi Sports Training and Competition Center (now Hanoi Sports Training and Competition Center) Dao Quoc Thang and the leaders of Son Tay town to discuss the coordination of discovering and training high-performance athletes. At that time, Son Tay town sports did not have any sport that was considered a spearhead that could contribute to high-performance sports in Hanoi.

But after the above meeting, the Hanoi Sports Training and Competition Center affirmed that it will coordinate to discover, train and coach athletes of the town to win international medals.
After that, the chess department of the Center was assigned the above task. During a direct survey, the coach of the department, International Grandmaster Bui Vinh, clearly recognized the human potential of Son Tay town suitable for chess. In order to have a solid foundation for training, discovering talents, and creating a movement, the Hanoi Chess Department and the Vietnam Chess Federation coordinated with the town to organize basic training courses on chess coaching for coaches and teachers in the area as well as neighboring areas. At the same time, organize and maintain the Son Tay Open Chess Tournament to create a playground and attract athletes. Up to now, both of the above tasks are effective when the town owns a team of instructors with basic knowledge of chess coaching. From there, it is easy to train and discover talented players. At the same time, the annual Son Tay Open Chess Tournament is a good brand, often attracting several hundred players to participate in the tournament.

As for the direct task of selecting players to invest in and train to win international medals, the Hanoi coaches have selected a number of players to invest in intensively, including Nguyen Xuan Phuong. Most importantly, this player's family can support their son by taking him from his home in Trung Son Tram ward (Son Tay town) to the chess training location on Trinh Hoai Duc street (Hanoi).

On the days when Xuan Phuong goes to practice at the Trinh Hoai Duc training site, Nguyen Thi Thom - the player's mother, takes her son by bus to be on time for practice at 7pm. Her husband rides a motorbike from Son Tay town to Trinh Hoai Duc street to pick up the mother and son after each practice session, usually around 9pm. The total journey to and from each practice session is about 80km, lasting for many days. This has contributed to bringing sweet fruits to this young player as well as Hanoi chess and Son Tay town sports. Medals at international tournament levels have come to this player one after another...

In particular, at the 2023 Southeast Asian Youth Chess Championship in Thailand, Nguyen Xuan Phuong competed in the U8 age group, winning 5 gold medals and 1 silver medal for both individuals and teams in standard, rapid and blitz chess.

At the 2023 Asian Youth Chess Championship in the United Arab Emirates, this boy born in 2015 won 2 gold medals, 1 silver medal in the team event; 1 silver medal, 1 bronze medal in the individual event in the U8 age group.

And at the 2025 World Youth Rapid and Blitz Chess Championship held in Greece in mid-April 2025, Xuan Phuong won the Bronze Medal in the U10 Blitz Chess individual category. That can be considered the sweet fruit of an investment journey in a locality that is a "blank area" in terms of high-performance sports.

Can't stop

International Grandmaster Bui Vinh once said that Nguyen Xuan Phuong and many other young players who won medals at international tournaments in recent times cannot stop, need to make more efforts, receive more investment to become international Grandmasters. Thanks to that, they can make a living from their profession. In addition to their expertise, these players also need to practice English to be able to access chess documents (currently 90% of documents are in English), learn chess online and directly with foreign coaches. At the same time, they need to be confident in communicating, thereby solving problems in international competitions, and at the same time building an image for Vietnamese chess as well as themselves.

Sharing this view, Son Tay town also took specific actions. In particular, the town leaders acted as a bridge for an English Center to accompany chess player Xuan Phuong. The center designed an English course worth more than 140 million VND, suitable for the player's training and competition schedule. The ultimate goal is to ensure that this player achieves an IELTS certificate of 6.5. In addition, the town leaders also arranged for Xuan Phuong to have an iPad for online chess practice; contacted the Hanoi Transport Corporation to give free bus tickets to support travel expenses for the mother and son. Son Tay Town Party Secretary Tran Anh Tuan also affirmed to the Hanoi Chess Department that the locality can join hands to support Xuan Phuong's accommodation expenses during the summer of 2025 so that he can focus on practicing at the department's location. Thanks to that, this player does not have to travel continuously from home to the training location every day.

That is the positive effect that professionals like Grandmaster Bui Vinh are really impressed with. Grandmaster Bui Vinh also said that Hanoi chess recently has a group of talented young athletes thanks to the cooperation from many sides - families, state management agencies, businesses and the locality where the athletes live, where their talents were discovered. Therefore, if there is more support similar to the case of chess player Xuan Phuong, Vietnamese chess as well as Hanoi will have more talented forces.

Head of the Department of Sports Management (Hanoi Department of Culture and Sports) Dao Quoc Thang said that there are many paths to success for an athlete. Among those paths, it is certain that a coordination formula between family, local government, state management agency of sports, and enterprises is still needed because it is suitable for the conditions of many families today. Each person will contribute to creating great talents for the country's sports.

Source: https://cand.com.vn/the-thao/co-vua-nang-buoc-cho-tai-nang-tre-i769873/