Titled Field Heads to Monastir as the Sahel Festival Eyes Sousse 2027

Fresh from the Olympiad, a group of titled players is heading to Tunisia for the Sahel Chess Festival, which runs October 24 to November 1, 2026 in the resort town of Monastir. About 300 international competitors are expected at the four-star Hotel El Habib on the central coast.

For a continent with an active chess community but few international opens, that is a meaningful event. This is the final call for entries.

Who is confirmed

The top name in Group A is GM Titas Stremavicius of Lithuania (2558). He won the national title in 2021, 2025 and 2026 and played board one at his third Olympiad, going unbeaten. His draws came against Tabatabaei (2737), Vitiugov (2666), Sarana (2666), Deac (2644), Nguyen (2633) and Saric (2623).

He also has a giant-killing record. As a 2025 World Cup qualifier, he knocked out Wesley So in the second round.

GM Pavel Ponkratov (2540, FID) is next on the list. He won the Russian Rapid Cup in 2017 and 2018, and took the 2021 Russian Championship Higher League, which put him into the Russian Superfinal and the World Cup.

Dutch GM Friso Nijboer (2441) played six Olympiads between 1996 and 2006 and has written four volumes on opening theory.

The home contingent

Tunisia’s top active player, IM Kamel Njili (2406), captained the Tunisian women’s team at the Olympiad. He has just launched the Njili Chess Academy in Tunis, which already trains hundreds of young players.

GM Amir Zaibi (2343) also flies the flag. He earned his grandmaster title in 2020 by winning the Arab Chess Championship.

Trainers and prospects

GM Mihail Marin (2413) of Romania, a well-known ChessBase author and trainer, captained the Italian women’s team at the Olympiad. He is travelling with WFM Maria Yugina (2052, ROU), his partner, an artist and player.

India sends two young players: WGM Priyanka Nutakki (2261) and twelve-year-old CM Aryan Mehta (2203). Aryan will come with his coach, GM Farrukh Amonatov (2598) of Tajikistan.

Why the middle of the field matters

Negotiations with more titled players continue, and the prize funds are modest. The draw is different: title norms are hard to come by for players outside the elite circuits, and a field with this many grandmasters gives norm hunters real opponents.

That is the logic of privately run opens, and the strongest case for one in Africa. For a rising player, a rating of 2200 to 2300 like Mehta’s or Nutakki’s pays off only if the games are against strong, varied opposition.

Sousse in 2027

The festival has a date with history next year. The 2027 edition moves to Sousse to mark 60 years since the 1967 Sousse Interzonal, which Bobby Fischer played. It is a short hop from Monastir and a fitting home for a tournament trying to put Tunisia on the international calendar.

Fischer’s Sousse is best remembered because he left the event while leading, after a dispute over scheduling around his religious observance, and so never finished it. The Sahel organizers are presumably hoping that this time the memory is of the chess and the sea, not the walkout.

Entries and technical details are on the festival’s website and on Chess-Results.