Xianggi team gatecrashes POC roster

MANILA, Philippines - Nobody knows, or at least nobody wants to admit, how a mind sport like xianggi made its way to the POC roster and into the Asian Games.

Xianggi, like chess, is a mind sport, which is very popular among Chinese. It is debuting in the Asian Games this year on the strength of its being an indigenous, popular sport among one billion Chinese in China, Hong Kong, Macau, Malaysia, Singapore and the Philippines. It is also played in Japan.

When a group of xianggi-playing Chinese approached the POC that it be given a slot in Guangzhou, POC spokesperson Joey Romasanta referred them to chess secretary general and Tagaytay Mayor Bambol Tolentino.

Willie Abalos, captain of the chess team and by extension manager of the xianggi team, insisted the group never talked to him.

“I don’t know them. They never talked to me,” was Abalos’ passive reply when asked about his xianggi players during the team’s flight aboard China Southern Lines bound for Guangzhou.

Romasanta denies having approved the entry of the players.

“I never saw any application form. I knew only about it when their names appeared on the lineup of chess team,” he said. Xianggi, which traces its roots to the Warring States Period in China, represents a battle between two armies with the objective of capturing the enemy’s “general.”

The book on the game, which is played like chess, says distinctive features of xiangqi include the unique movement of the pao (“cannon”) piece, a rule prohibiting the generals (similar to chess kings) from facing each other directly, and the river and palace board features, which restrict the movement of some pieces.

The other mind game making its entry in the Games is weigi, which has been popular in China since 2,500 years ago.

Here, the black and white stones are displayed on a weigi board with 361 crosses made of 19 vertical lines and 19 horizontal lines.

Asked whether the players are weiqi or xianggi players, a grandmaster vowed he did not know. The players could not be contacted by the chess federation or interviewed by media because nobody is introducing the two, who were listed as Jackson Hong and Sandy Chua.

“Hindi ko alam,” the chess player said when pressed for an answer. “The xianggi I know is where you buy cheap clothes on Sunday,”