Zdenko Kožul

Zdenko Kožul
Grenke Chess Open 2016
Full name	Zdenko Kožul
Country	Croatia
Born	(1966-05-21) 21 May 1966 (age 50) Bihać
Title	Grandmaster
FIDE rating	2616 (February 2017)
Peak rating	2640 (October 2004)

Zdenko Kožul (born 21 May 1966) is a Croatian chess grandmaster and was the 2006 European champion.

Kožul was born in the north-western Bosnian town of Bihać (then Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia). He was awarded the grandmaster title by FIDE in 1989. In 1989 and 1990, Kozul won consecutive Yugoslavian championships. In 1990, Kozul won the bronze medal playing for the Yugoslav team at the Chess Olympiad in Novi Sad.

After the break-up of Yugoslavia, Kozul played for Bosnia and Herzegovina, and he was a part of the Bosnian Olympiad team in 1992. In 1993, Kozul, an ethnic Croat, settled in Croatia, thereafter representing that country. In 1995, he won an open tournament in Zadar. In 1999, he came first at the IV Nova Gorica Open. In 2003, he won the 11th Vasja Pirc Memorial at Maribor.

In 2004, Kozul reached the final sixteen at the FIDE World Chess Championship, 2004 in Tripoli, before being eliminated by the Bulgarian grandmaster, future world champion Veselin Topalov. His greatest career achievement was his win at the 2006 European Individual Chess Championship in Kusadasi.

In March 2012, Kožul came first in the Zagreb Open.

According to Chessmetrics, at his peak in October 2000, Kožul's play was equivalent to a rating of 2647, and he was ranked number 50 in the world. His best single performance was at Tripoli (FIDE World Championship), 2004, where he scored 5.5 of 8 possible points (69%) against 2671-rated opposition, for a performance rating of 2724.