This year the Grand Prix Finale ended up with just 10 players taking part. It is supposed to have 16 players normally.
I wondered, does this reflect a trend of the Grand Prix being less interesting for players to take part in than before. The main criteria for interesting I would suspect would be financial reward or financial means. Or does it just indicate that the tournament took place in London, which as we all know costs A LOT.

If you look back through the years, the tables don't immediately strike me as being that different. In 2019 the Russians were playing. Generally speaking, the Grand Prix doesn't seem to pull in a lot of big names into regular participation apart from Lukas Podpera and Stanislaw Frejlak. Could a restructuration of the points & qualification system change that, or should we rather imagine that only an end to war and a bringing of copious bags of cash could change things.
https://www.eurogofed.org/grandprix/standings2019.html
https://www.eurogofed.org/grandprix/standings2022.html
https://www.eurogofed.org/grandprix/standings2023.html

_________________
North Lecale