Reigning world champion Ding Liren and top-ranked Magnus Carlsen will participate in next month's inaugural franchise-based Global Chess League (GCL), organisers said on Tuesday.The tournament will run from June 21 to July 2 in Dubai and feature six teams of six players each, including a minimum of two female players and an "icon" player per team.Carlsen and Ding will join as two of six "icon" players, along with Indian grandmaster Viswanathan Anand and Poland's Jan-Krzysztof Duda.
The final two names will be confirmed at a later date, organisers said."Global Chess League will be a great new event in over-the-board chess that has never been done before," Carlsen, who has been the world's top-ranked player for over a decade, said in a statement. "I'm excited to be a part of this unique mixed-team format."China's Ding, 30, became world champion in April, taking the crown from Carlsen, after the 32-year-old Norwegian said last year he would not defend his title.Dubai also staged the 2021 world championship, when Carlsen won his fifth title.Russian grandmaster Alexander Grischuk, France's Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, and Hou Yifan of China, a four-time women's world champion, will also participate in the tournament.Anand, 53, held the world title from 2007-13, when he lost to Carlsen, and was elected as the deputy president of world governing body FIDE last August.The GCL is a joint venture between FIDE and Indian IT services provider Tech Mahindra."My involvement with the GCL predates my becoming deputy president," Anand told Reuters. "I was in discussions with Mahindra and I was advising them more than a year before that."Once I went on to become the FIDE deputy president, it slotted in nicely.