Making the right moves

CHESS champion Stephen Gordon

CHECK him out — Stephen Gordon has made all the right moves to become Oldham’s first chess Grandmaster.

The 23-year-old, from Shaw, has risen through the ranks to attain the highest title a player can achieve, apart from world champion.

Stephen has been playing chess professionally for the past year since he graduated from Birmingham University with a degree in maths and business.

Rated ninth in the UK and 500th in the world, he is hoping to take his chess career as far as possible.

Stephen started playing chess aged six to compete against his father and brother, and joined the 3Cs (Children’s Chess Club). Along with his natural talent, Stephen credits the expert coaching and commitment from 3Cs members for his chess success.

He said: “Chess is a game of mini puzzles, where you have to anticipate what your opponent will do and react accordingly.

“I’m quite logically minded and enjoy solving puzzles so I picked it up ok. I was coached by Steve Rigby and Phil Adams at the club until I was about 15.

“The club do a fantastic job, they have two or three coaches at different levels to ensure you are constantly learning and you don’t hit a wall.

“I then progressed on my own by taking part in tournaments in Europe.

“With every competition you gain experience, and when a game is finished you often have a chat to your opponent about it. It all builds up.”

The talented player has won the British under-21 title a total of four times and was European Union under-21 champion in 2006.

But his biggest achievement is being selected to play chess for England in the European Team Chess Championship in Serbia next month.

He said: “There are a lot of younger chess players coming through the ranks at the moment, the world number two is 19-year-old Magnus Carlsen from Norway.

“This can be attributed to the amount of computers and computer programmes that are available these days.

“I have to be realistic, I won’t get to that level. Getting to the next level will require me putting a lot of hard work in.

“I’ll have to join the real world soon and get a job although I have no idea what I want to do.

“But I will still be playing for another year or so and make my decision then.”