Jan Henric Buettner might have imagined that it would be a bit easier to get into the chess scene. As sponsor of the Freestyle Chess Grand Slam, the Hamburg businessman has spent a lot of money to get the project off the ground and, together with Magnus Carlsen, has raised even more money to get the tournament series off to a flying start. But it's not all plain sailing.

Before the start of the Freestyle Chess Grand Slam 2025, there was a long and intensive dispute with FIDE, or more precisely with its prominent representatives Arkady Dvorkovich and Emil Sutovsky. FIDE claimed the right to the title of world chess champion for itself, apparently also for all chess variants. Buettner spent a lot of time trying to come to an agreement with Dvorkovich and Sutovsky. However, in the end there was no agreement. FIDE threatened the players involved in the Freestyle Grand Slam and pointed out that they could only take part in one world championship. Theirs and no other.

In view of this dispute, the Freestyle Chess Organisation apparently adjusted the contracts for the participants. It is not known how. Eleven of the twelve participants in the Paris Grand Slam had no problem signing the amended contracts to participate in the tournament. However, there was no response from Alireza Firouzja.

In a video interview with Take Take Take, Jan Henric Buettner talks about the difficult negotiations with the French top player. Firouzja got in touch a week before the start of the tournament and explained that he wasn't happy with the new contract. After some back and forth, he sent a copy with the parts he didn't like marked. Buettner negotiated the contract point by point and an agreement was finally reached. On Wednesday last week, Firouzja got back in touch and tried to negotiate his fee. After some discussion and no concessions from Buettner, the contract points were discussed again.

Since Firouzja was still not ready to sign five days before the start of the tournament, Richard Rapport was finally hired as a replacement. A few days later, Hans Niemann also withdrew from the event, as previously reported.

Here are Jan Henric Buettner's comments: