The Euro Championships ended with a controversy regarding the tie-breaker system, with Peter Heine Nielsen pointing out how it’s illogical. That has sparked a massive debate about alternatives.
The chess community is over-populated with mathematically and statistically competent people, who are prepared to argue about nuances until the cows come home. It’s likely that something less flawed will eventually be accepted by consensus. The suggestions currently range from the sane to the weird and wonderful.
Meanwhile, several events of differing strength and importance are in progress or have just concluded. Abhijeet Gupta pipped Parimarjan Negi in the last round to win Dubai Open (150 players). Gupta went 7.5 from 9 rounds while Negi, Balogh, Kazhgaleyev and Hammer made 7 each to tie for 2nd-5th. The time control was 90 minutes+ 30 seconds increment for the game. The same control features in the US championships, which is a two-tier system. First there are two group round robins (RR) of 8 players each and then, knock-out semi finals and a final. It has a $166,000 prize fund with $40K for the champion.
Tiebreaks start with rapids and a final “Armageddon bid game” involves game theory. Black has draw odds. Each player bids an amount of time with an upper limit of 45 minutes (in minutes and second <= 45:00 ) they are willing to take on the clock to play with their colour choice. The player who bids the lower time chooses colour and receives that initial time ; the other player gets 45:00. If both bid exactly the same time, a coin-flip determines colour.
In the men’s section, Kamsky(4.5 from 6) and Shulman (4) lead in Group A with one round to go while Hess (5) leads Group B, with Onischuk and Shankland tied on 3.5 in second. The women’s championship has a single group RR of eight players with the top four qualifying for KO semi-finals. Irina Krush leads with 5 from 6 ahead of Foisor, Baginskaite, Abrahamyan (all 4).
Finally, there’s the Russian Teams championship, which is one of the toughest showcase events — 12 team RR with 6 player matches. Every oligarch generously supports his local team and the players are drawn from all over. After seven rounds, Tomsk400 (fifth seeded with average elo 2686! ) leads with the maximum 14 match points ahead of HSM64, with 13 MP.
The diagram, WHITE TO PLAY, (Gupta Vs Negi, Dubai Open) is from the last round. Negi just needed to draw for first place. But he’s blundered with his last move, 27.-- Be4. White played the devastating 28.Rxd4! Cd4 , Variations like 28. --Bxc2 29. Rxd8+ Rxd8 30. Nxe5 and 28...Qxd4 29.Nxd4 Bxc2 30.Nxc2 or 28...Rxd4 29.Nxe5 Bxc2 30.Rxc2 all lose as trivially. 29.Qxc8 Qd5 30.Qc7 Rd7 31.Qe5 (1-0).
Devangshu Datta is an internationally-rated chess and correspondence chess player
