Hikaru criticizes Andrea Botez for making jokes at World Chess Championship
Twitch/Chess/Instagram/itsandreabotezTwitch chess sensation Andrea Botez is under fire from GM Hikaru Nakamura for asking a joke question to competitors at the World Chess Championship between Magnus Carlsen and Ian Nepomniachtchi.
Andrea, along with her older sister Alexandra, has been touring the world as part of a big international tour that brought them from England and France to Norway and now Dubai.
Their Dubai trip had the Botez sisters make their way into the World Chess Championship with Andrea able to ask questions at the post-match press conference.
Unfortunately for Andrea, not everyone was pleased with her line of questioning, as GM Hikaru called her out during his Twitch stream.
Botez asks joke question at World Chess Championship
After waiting in line to speak and letting the two competitors answer some serious chess questions, Andrea got on the microphone “reporting” from her BotezLive channel.
“Hello, Ian and Magnus, great game today. Another draw, who would have guessed?” she rhetorically asked. “I bet you’re really tired of getting a lot of really complicated chess questions. But, I’ve been dying to ask you, how does the Knight move?”
For his part, Magnus cracked a soft smile and gave a serious answer to her “good” question, explaining that the piece moves like an “L” and remarked how it can be unpredictable in Blitz games.
With that, Andrea sat down with her chat in awe that she actually asked such a bizarre question at a serious event. However, the comment was also a bit of an inside joke between the two as earlier in 2021, Magnus explained to the sisters how the Knight moves.
Hikaru slams Botez for joke question for Magnus Carlsen
GM Hikaru wasn’t too pleased with the comment and addressed it on stream, stating how while he understands doing things for content, there are still limits.
“I’m going to be honest, in a world championship match, that should not happen,” he said. “Joking aside, it’s one thing to make content, but for a world championship press conference, the most serious event that we have in the chess world, that should not be happening.”
While Hikaru even commented on how his criticism could start some drama within the community, he doubled down, yet again reiterating how that question “should not happen.”
I want to say THANK YOU to @itsandreabotez for asking Magnus Carlsen how the knight moves at the press conference today. Now we will have several good days of chess drama content between people who are mad and people who don’t care.
— GothamChess (@GothamChess) December 1, 2021
Despite Hikaru’s concerns, other big names, such as GothamChess, issued a “thank you” to Andrea on Twitter for providing “several good days of chess drama content between people who are mad and people who don’t care.”
So far, neither Alexandra or Andrea have addressed Hikaru’s concerns, but they did retweet GothamChess’s remarks, suggesting they are fully aware of his criticisms.
