 What is the significance of the players’ names?
The large hall was crammed with energetic dark-suited men of whom a disproportionately large number were bald, wore glasses, were faintly untidy and indefinably shabby, had Slavic or Scandinavian features, and talked foreign languages. The many clocks, bedside table size, would have struck a familiar note except that they had little red flags and wheels sprinkled over their faces and they were all in pairs, two clocks to a case. Her last assignment had been to interview the pilot pair riding the first American manned circum-lunar satellite—and the five alternate pairs who hadn't made the flight. Samples: "They say the Machine has been programmed to play nothing but pure Barcza System and Indian Defenses—and the Dragon Formation if anyone pushes the King Pawn." In that case...." "The Russians have come with ten trunkfuls of prepared variations and they'll gang up on the Machine at adjournments. "It is a curse of the intellect. It is a game for lunatics—or else it creates them. "You know nothing whatsoever of chess—so you will be able to write about it understandably for your readers." What the Machine can do is examine all the likely lines of play for about eight moves ahead—that is, four moves each for White and Black—and then decide which is the best move on the basis of capturing enemy pieces, working toward checkmate, establishing a powerful central position and so on." In crucial situations, say where there's a chance of winning at once by trapping the enemy king, he examines many more moves ahead than that—thirty or forty even. The Machine is probably programmed to recognize such situations and do something of the same sort, though we can't be sure from the information World Business Machines has released. But in most chess positions the possibilities are so very nearly unlimited that even a grandmaster can only look a very few moves ahead and must rely on his judgment and experience and artistry. The equivalent of those in the Machine is the directions fed into it before it plays a game." Flesh-and-blood chess masters have lost games by blunders they could have avoided by looking only one or two moves ahead. Once again, you see, you have the human factor, in this case working for the Machine." To either side of the hall were tiers of temporary seats, about half of them occupied.
 The players’ names correspond with what country has the most chess mastery, with Russian names hold the utmost interest.
 The players’ names correspond with which countries won World War II  The players’ names represent how chess rivals reflect political rivals.  The players’ names signify the level of competence each chess master has, with American names being the most competent.  The players’ names correspond with what country has the most chess mastery, with Russian names hold the utmost interest.