The 12th World Cup of the intellectual game ‘What? Where? When?’ has finished in Tbilisi. Yesterday the qualifying stage took place, which was attended by 59 teams from 24 countries. Today 18 teams from Russia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Great Britain, Georgia, Israel, Latvia, Moldova, the USA, Uzbekistan, Ukraine and Finland fought in the final for the title of world champion. All three prizes went to representatives of the Russian Federation.
The 2015 World Champion in the game ‘What? Where? When?’ became the team of Sergey Nikolenko, second place was taken by the team of Alexey Bogoslvosky and third place went to Mikhail Savchenkov. The team of David Rapava (Georgia) and the team of Balash Kasumov (Azerbaijan) entered the top 12 of the best teams in the world.
In an interview with Vestnik Kavkaza the captain of the winning team noted the triumph of St. Petersburg in the championship, as the teams that won the first and the second places are from the northern capital of Russia. Sergey Nikolenko also shared with Vestnik Kavkaza his impressions of the tournament: "The first day was better than the second, in spite of everything, though the first day, in fact, was not so important, but it's good that we won. Before the start we considered our main opponents to be the team of Mikhail Savchenkov, they eventually finished third, but today they were somehow far behind, and the unexpected leader of the team was Alexei Bogoslvosky, relatively unexpected, because it is a team that always plays well, but no one expected such a breakthrough from them. Everything was decided in the last round."
‘’I can highlight our legionary from Israel, Vladimir Sadov. None of them had played with him before, we did not personally know him, but he played just great, brought a lot to this victory. I am very happy that we found him. Russian-Israeli friendship won in Georgia," the captain of the champion team said.
Talking about the atmosphere of the Tbilisi championship, Sergey Nikolenko admitted that he was visiting Georgia for the first time: "I was in Tbilisi, in Georgia for the first time. The organization was very pleasing, the room is wonderful, there is a lot of air, this is the most important thing. I came for three days, did not see anything, but maybe next time I will have time. The atmosphere is really very similar to the world championships which were in the past and the year before, but I'm waiting for the Georgian flavor tonight at the banquet. "
The co-chairman of the Organizing Committee of the 12th World Championship ‘What? Where? When?’, George Mosidze, summed up the tournament for Vestnik Kavkaza: "The game part of the 12th World Cup is finished. The winners are determined, the unexpected did not happen, the winners are the strongest, the festival took place. I think this is a good pledge for the future of Georgia to host another such event. And this is an incentive for Georgian youth to read more books and learn and finally win the world championship of ‘What? Where? When?’ in the future.
George Mosidze noted that the greatest force majeure was the weather: "The weather let us down. But the magic of Tbilisi does wonders, so I think the guests will leave being satisfied. The Georgian team got into the top ten in the final. I think it's very a good result, due to such strong participants."
Despite the fact that the 12th World Championship began on Friday 13th, the organizing committee of the championship said that the experts are not superstitious people, so Georgia is pleased to host another World Cup in a few years and is ready to do it again on Friday 13th.
