The Chess Education Market: System Openings, Anti-System Courses, and the Pipeline Ledger

The headline sits at the top. A quote, in large type — 'Chess is massively undervalued.' Below it, a name: Turlov. Then the whole page becomes an advertisement for six videos, written by an International Master, Valeri Lilov. The headline and the body are two separate worlds here. The quote concerns the chess market; the advertisement concerns an anti-system repertoire for Black. The bridge that should connect the two is missing. In my notebook this is the first entry: the headline says one thing; the page says another. In thirty-five years on this beat I have learned that a loud quote pinned to the top of a page and the signed paper inside rarely agree. So I begin with suspicion and end with a table.

That afternoon was an ordinary Tuesday, and sitting at my Bangalore desk I opened the page and immediately wrote a note with a timestamp. The habit is old. The spreadsheet I opened in December 2026 at the BCF hall in Purana Paltan — every national champion since 2026, every score, every venue, and the federation's government grant, roughly Tk 12 lakh a year — its discipline is now welded to my eye. When someone makes a large claim, I first ask: what is the date, what is the number, and where is the paper.

What the advertisement is actually selling

Six videos. One plan per video. The content is an anti-system arsenal for Black — the Colle System, the Trompowsky Attack, the Torre Attack, the London System, the Catalan, the Blackmar-Diemer Gambit, and the Richter-Veresov Opening. These seven names are placed together under a single claim: your White opponent's favorite systems are in fact deeply dangerous.

I read the list twice. Because these names are not one family. The Colle, London, and Torre usually arise after 1.d4 d5 — White does not want to play 2.c4, so he sidesteps main-line theory. The Trompowsky, Richter-Veresov, and Catalan usually arise after 1.d4 Nf6. Placing these two worlds under one umbrella and calling it 'the family after 1.d4 d5' is a simplification. Technically it is imprecise, and imprecise classification usually appears when a market wants to scale a familiar name for sale.

Why the chess market arrived at this point

The extraordinary boom after 2026 is known to all of us. From their locked-down rooms, tens of millions began to learn chess. A direct fruit of that wave was the education market — courses, video series, subscriptions. This market is not a market of competition; it is a market of demand. The buyer here is the amateur player, rated somewhere between 1500 and 2200, who loses every week to the same kind of White setup and comes home.

I have seen this player at club tables many times. He plays the London System because it is easy to remember and it spares him a swim in the vast ocean of opening theory. His opponent is often unprepared too. So a game between two amateurs is frequently not a war of theory but a war of habit. This is the real market for the anti-system course.

One name deserves separate treatment

Among the seven names, one has genuinely reached the elite level — the London System. In recent years it has appeared regularly at the top, because it is a low-risk weapon and a safe house for White. The others — Colle, Torre, Blackmar-Diemer — are essentially club-level or surprise weapons. The Catalan is the exact opposite: a main-line system, a patient plan of a queenside bind and a fianchettoed bishop. Lining these four levels up in one row means convincing the consumer that all are equally dangerous. In reality they are not.

Here is my core observation: this product is not theoretical novelty; it is the sale of reassurance. A prepared antidote for Black against the systems White plays to avoid main-line theory — that is its value proposition. And that proposition is honest, if you know where it works. At elite level a prepared Black is comfortable against these setups. The real 'danger' begins at club level, in the roughly 1500–2200 rating zone, where the opponent is unprepared. The advertisement does not state this limit.

The facts the page omits

The biggest signal of an advertising page is what it does not say. Here there is no engine match rate, no ACPL, no sample game. 'The painful experience of many chess players' — this sentence is an unsourced generalization. Experience without a source is testimony, and testimony is not evidence. My rule is simple: I do not file any 'crisis' or 'danger' piece without a ten-year table attached. Here there is no table.

The author himself is a trainer and content creator. The International Master title is a lifetime honor, and it is respected. But on this page his authority rests on an appeal to experience, not on recent tournament results. This is an education-persona profile, not a competitive profile. The criteria for evaluating the two are different.

'Chess is massively undervalued' — let us check the sentence

This headline quote is the optimistic language of chess commerce. The name 'Turlov' is placed beside it, but which interview, in what context, who said it — that bridge is absent from the page. This is the clearest reliability signal: the quote was likely cut from its context and pinned onto a product to borrow prestige. I never print such a quote without seeing the primary interview.

And the sentence is itself vague. 'Undervalued' — by whom, in which market, by what measure? After 2026, chess has hardly been undervalued. On the contrary, this is the fastest-growing spectator market in its history. Online platform usage, open tournament crowds, streaming — all have risen. So whenever the word 'undervalued' is uttered, my question is: undervalued for whom?

Where the real undervaluation lies

Talent is not always born from nothing. Talent is born from a practice room, from a trainer's time, from a reliable school competition, from a transparent grant. It is precisely in these places that chess is genuinely undervalued, and precisely in these places that no product is sold, because here there is no comfortable feeling to offer.

The ledger of my own region is clear here. Bangladesh produced South Asia's first grandmaster in 2026 — Niaz Murshed, a year before Viswanathan Anand. India turned that moment into a generation. Bangladesh turned that moment into a monument. On today's balance sheet the count reads five against more than eighty. A one-year lead became a forty-year deficit. I write this pair not as nostalgia but as accounting: what exactly did each country do with its first grandmaster.

Here the comparison with Anand should be spent in one paragraph, no more. Because the real story is not in that one-year gap. The real story is in the Purana Paltan hall in Dhaka, in the federation's grant letter, and in the decision of a teenager's parents.

The pipeline autopsy

In 2026, Enamul Hossain Razib became Bangladesh's fifth and last grandmaster. Since then there has been no new grandmaster for seventeen years. My standing argument is simple: seventeen years without a new grandmaster is not a talent drought; it is a sponsorship drought. The federation runs on roughly Tk 12 lakh a year. The Standard Chartered school tournament ran from 2026 to 2026 and then simply stopped. Between 2026 and 2026 no grandmaster-norm tournament was held on home soil.

Read these three sentences together and you see that the chess education market and the chess pipeline are two different economies. One sells a solution to a consumer; the other gives a child time. One is profitable; the other is nearly free. The market therefore rushes toward the first.

In 2026 I camped for nineteen days on the Premier Division Chess League's pre-tournament window, when Police, Navy, Biman, and the bank sides were bringing Indian grandmasters to their top boards. In nineteen days I logged fourteen guest signings. The table showed: of the twenty top-board seats, eleven went to imports. I do not call this a scandal; I call it a ledger. Standards rose, local junior board-hours fell. Let the numbers make the argument.

The content economy and the pipeline: two speeds

Now the question is whether a product like the anti-system course adds anything to the pipeline. It does, somewhat — if the student uses it as a supplement to principles. But if he treats it as a substitute for principles, harm follows. Because a 'system' opening means a closed room standing on the general rules of chess, and that can be memorized. But the beauty of chess lies in principles — why a move is part of a plan, why a bind is valuable. The player who memorizes only patterns gets stuck around 1500.

I do not want to be unfair here. This kind of course genuinely helps many club players, and the labor of a trainer like Lilov cannot be belittled. But the language of a product and the language of a trainer are different. The product says 'extremely dangerous'; the trainer would have said 'it will work at club level, be careful at elite level.' The first sells; the second tells the truth.

The competitive context: nobody entered

There is no player's name on this page, no event, no rating, no game. So a competitive landscape analysis is not possible here, and I will not manufacture one. What exists is a chess-market signal: the popularity of low-theory systems has risen, and the education market is converting that demand into currency. This is an indicator of demand, not of strength.

My notebook says one thing; the tape says another

For more than two decades I have stood beside top tables and watched games. There I have seen that a prepared Black never sweats at these systems. He knows he has a clear plan against the Colle's slow build-up. The fear is sold at the lower tables, where the opponent has little time and little preparation. My notebook wrote 'a club-level threat'; the page wrote 'extreme danger.' The two are not the same.

The contrarian angle: the economy of anxiety

A comfortable phrase circulates here — chess is undervalued, so you must learn more, so buy another course. But if that sentence were true, the heaviest investment should have gone to trainer education, to school tables, to grant letters. It did not. Instead the investment went where returns are fastest — into the consumer's hands.

A second contrarian observation: the real risk of this product is not competitive but informational. If a page pins one person's quote to the headline and sells another person's product inside, then every other claim on that page must be questioned too. The buyer's duty is simple: read the word 'dangerous' as marketing, not as analysis.

A third observation: the habit of memorizing only patterns diminishes chess understanding. A 'system' opening is essentially a defensive habit — it helps you avoid preparation, but it does not teach you why a position is good or bad. Understanding is built on principles, and principles are hard to teach, slow, and less profitable. That is why the market loves selling systems more than principles.

A fourth observation: the word 'undervalued' manufactures an artificial scarcity. A scarcity that is artificial has an artificial solution — another course, another video. But a seventeen-year-old boy who wants to become a grandmaster needs a trainer who sits beside him every day, a tournament where he can earn a norm, a grant that lets him buy food. None of these come inside any video package.

A harsh but real comparison

On 5 July 2026, Grandmaster Ziaur Rahman — fifteen-time national champion, holder of Bangladesh's highest-ever rating of 2570 — suffered a heart attack mid-game and died. He was still playing chess for bread and butter. I had interviewed him a dozen times. Within an hour of hearing the news I was on the phone to Dhaka, writing the prize-money figures inside the obituary.

Only five months later, Manon Reja Neer, at fourteen, won the National Championship undefeated. I write the two stories as one: the system that killed a champion, and the boy that system must not kill next. Then in 2026, thirty-eight years after becoming South Asia's first grandmaster, Niaz Murshed won his seventh national title at fifty-nine.

These three dates — 2026, 2026, 2026 — I keep together and have begun writing a long arc. And I have handed my spreadsheet to the younger reporters along with my rule: do not write 'the next Niaz Murshed' about anyone without twelve months of verification.

Why this comparison is relevant here

Because the promise of the content economy and the reality of the pipeline are not the same. A course will tell you your opponent's system is dangerous, so buy this. A federation could not have told you that, because its hands held Tk 12 lakh and a dark hall. But in a country that could not turn its first grandmaster into anything beyond a title, the phrase 'undervalued chess' is an indictment, not a sales tactic.

Round three is where the season stopped, not where it ended

In March 2026 I was in Dhaka to cover the Premier Division League when play was suspended after round three and the Purana Paltan hall went dark for eighteen months. During that shutdown I sat on the phone and logged what it cost the players — board fees, coaching income, and the jobs they held. For a while I refused to call screen games chess at all.

Then in September 2026, in the year of Tokyo's empty-seat Olympics, I covered the FIDE Online Chess Olympiad and the first over-the-board national rounds since 2026. Since that day I keep a separate online-results ledger, and I never mix online and OTB data in one paragraph. Every rating carries a tag, and before I ask a player for a score I ask what the shutdown cost him.

Nineteen days can change a club

Those nineteen days in 2026 were a lesson for me. A club brought an Indian grandmaster to its top board; its standard rose, its reputation rose. But at the same time a local junior lost a board. I keep these signatures in a permanent ledger, and against every signing I write its local cost: one more Indian grandmaster, one fewer board for a Dhaka junior. Rival desks chase the rumor; I wait for the signed sheet, then print the table.

The education market and the pipeline: two different jobs

Now I place the two side by side. One side is the education market, with products, courses, subscriptions, and demand. The other is the pipeline, with federations, grants, schools, and patience. These are two different things, and confusing them is the greatest mistake.

What the education market does is make people who already play a little better. What the pipeline does is seat new people at the table. The first is fast, visible, profitable. The second is slow, invisible, costly. Any country that confuses its pipeline with the first gets quick satisfaction and slowly falls behind. Bangladesh's forty-year balance sheet is the proof of this difference.

A filter for the buyer

If you are about to buy a product like this, my advice is simple and procedural. First, see where the product works — at club level or elite level. Advertising usually hides the limit. Second, see whether there is any sample game; zero samples means zero evidence. Third, verify the quote against a primary source; if there is a gap between headline and body, that is the biggest warning. Fourth, buy the product as a supplement to principles, not a substitute.

Its flow through the chess industry

This page is a small piece of a large picture. Three layers are now clear in the chess industry: the upstream layer of youth training and talent supply, the midstream of events, players, and platforms, and the downstream of content, commerce, and derivative markets. This page is a donor to the downstream. It adds almost nothing to the upstream, because it does not create new talent; it converts the fear of existing players into currency.

There is a quiet but important signal here: the popularity of low-theory systems has grown enough that creating a dedicated product against them has become profitable. This means the population of amateur players is now large enough, and their preparation gap familiar enough. This is a signal of demand, not of talent. Keeping these two signals apart is the job of a journalist.

What I do not want to see, and what I do

I do not want to see another advertisement of fear, in which every system is 'dangerous' and every course 'essential.' I want to see one honest sentence: this course will help you at club level, and from here you can move on to principles.

And I want to see investment in trainer education. Former stars opening academies is mostly branding; it teaches chess about as much as a logo teaches a curriculum. The real work is done by the trainer who, in the corner of a hall, explains to fifteen children the reason behind one move. He has no video, no advertisement, and nobody prints his name. But the pipeline is built in his hands.

An open file: who is Turlov

I keep one file open, over a single name — Turlov. If he is a known chess patron or executive, the quote may come from an interview, and that could be a signal of capital flowing into chess. But until I see the primary interview, I will treat this quote as prestige pinned onto a product. Thirty-five years have taught me: the bigger the name, the more the primary paper must be checked.

The age of the London System, and its shadow

The rise of the London System at elite level is a real event, and I acknowledge it. It shows that even at the top there is demand for low-risk, low-preparation openings. But it has a shadow: when elite players play a system, millions of amateurs imitate it. And it is on the wave of that imitation that the anti-system product market stands. In other words, the driving force of the market is not elite play, but the shadow of elite play.

This shadow is what I watch most, because here the line between truth and marketing blurs. A top player plays the London for his own reasons and logic; an amateur plays it because the big names play it. The first knows what he is doing; the second does not. And the second's uncertainty is the easiest thing to sell.

The balance sheet: what remains in the end

I reconcile the accounts. The education market is growing, there is no doubt, and it is bringing chess into more homes — that is a good thing. But this market does not create new grandmasters, does not identify new talent, does not put new countries on the chess map. The pipeline does those things. And the pipeline is built on patience, on grants, and on a lit hall.

When I travel with the Bangladesh squad to the Chess Olympiad in Samarkand in 2026 — my twelfth on the beat — the country will be watching the football World Cup in North America. There I will file a fifty-year arc: 2026, 2026, 2026, and whatever comes next. In that arc there will be a question whose answer is not yet written: will this vast market of chess education ever turn toward the pipeline, or will it forever look toward the consumer?

Last entry

The headline said chess is massively undervalued. The table says chess is in fact massively valued — but in the wrong place. It is valued in the market where people buy a feeling. It remains undervalued in the market where a child learns a move. As long as the distance between these two markets remains, every year will birth another 'dangerous' system and another 'essential' course.

I am not closing the notebook. I keep one name open — Turlov. I track one number — Neer's next norm, month by month against the 2026 cutoff. And I leave one question, which will test the chess education market over the next five years: are these courses truly leading players toward principles, or are they locking them deeper into the room of patterns? The answer will not be in any page's headline. The answer will be on the table.