Sun 18 Nov 2007

The Disappointing State Of Chess Scandals

In today's (well, tomorrow's if you're in the US, since the article is dated "Sunday" and it's still Saturday in the USA as I write this) Washington Post, there's an op-ed by Paul Hoffman about cheating in chess. Worth reading if you've ever been confused into thinking chess was a game played by ladies and gentlemen.

Although the article focuses on the more ridiculous side of cheating allegations, the ones that were typically completely unfounded, the issue isn't a non-event. The reason farcical allegation arise is because they're not always wrong! It's also very easy to accidentally appear to be cheating or step over the line slightly as far as ethical behaviour goes.

Well-meaning parents of junior players often fuss over their offspring. Passing them a sandwich or reminding them to have a drink or a snack bar so they don't lose energy (often distracting the opponent and the games around them at the same time). At the same time, well-meaning parent or grandparent might also remind the kid "and don't forget to watch your rooks like we discussed" or "don't forget to take your time." Nope. Busted. Once the game starts (in tournament conditions), no outside help allowed! As a tournament director, I've had more than one parent counter such requests (to please don't help their child) with "but they're just a child." So?? They enter under the same conditions as everybody else, not as part of a four person team of trainers and in-game coaches. Disappointingly (for me), this kind of over-protective and ultimately over-the-line behaviour is so often driven by a wish for a better score at all costs; confusing good score with good overall result. For tournament organisers, finding the right balance between an enjoyable atmosphere (locking parents in a storage room, as seen in the Searching For Bobby Fisher movie, is sometimes desirable, but not particularly polite or welcomed) and one that is under control is very hard.

Then there are the players (usually quite experienced ones) who will want to talk about your game with you whilst it's going on. Aside from the distraction, it's also grounds for forfeit. If a strong player says "your position will be fine once you exchange rooks. You're doing well, aren't you?", forgetting that you might not realise that, think of the help you've just received. Of course, strong player could be completely wrong in their assessment, but it's still somewhere between distracting to you and disadvantageous to your opponent. Often strong player doesn't even realise they're providing assistance, be it good or bad. I've personally had this happen to me so frequently that I don't think the offenders realise how often they are doing it.

Finally, another example of perceived cheating (which is usually, but not always, quite the opposite) is The Foreign Language Conversation. A lot of people don't speak English as their first language. Particularly at chess tournaments. It's a great place to meet immigrants and foreign tourists, since it's such an international game and, traditionally, it's the central and eastern European countries who have supplied the strongest players. So imagine you are playing Person A. Person A has a tendency to walk around when it's not their move (neither illegal nor uncommon; I usually can't sit still for the entire three to six hours when I'm playing). Suppose they also wander over to their friend, Person B, and start chatting away in their common native, non-English language. After a while, you see Person A gesticulating towards your game. A-ha (you think)! Clearly, he's getting advice. Time to raise a stink. How do you know? He was possibly just indicating he had to stop talking now and get back to his game, whilst his friend was insisting he waited just a minute to hear the end of the story. Or maybe they were making dinner plans and Person A was indicating "my opponent! He's playing so well! It'll be a few more hours." I'm not saying all of these situations are innocent (I've seen more than a few that I'm sure were in-game help sessions), but it's pretty much unprovable either way. So the only result is confusion and hurt feelings all around.

This isn't to claim that cheating doesn't happen. There are lots of documented and, sadly, very recent cases of people losing their grip on why they're playing. I've personally witnessed one case of somebody throwing a game: at a world under 12(!) tournament, of interest to me because it was done to guarantee the lucky winner third place ahead of a group including the Australian representative. The appeal wasn't upheld in that case, because, short of a confession, it's impossible to prove anything. Still, if somebody scores 9.5/10 and then loses simply in round 11 when they are already guaranteed first place and the "winner" is from the same country and is thus guaranteed third place... well, there's no real doubt in my mind. (For those wondering, world under 12's is still a pretty serious tournament. The winner of that particular event in 1998 is currently in the world's top 10, the silver medallist is in the top 40, the Australian representative is the current number two in Australia. Other players finishing in a tie for fourth include the current number two Indian player and another player in the world's top 50. Those kids can play!)

All this disappoints me a great deal. A well organised, well run chess tournament with a nice group of participants is a lot of fun. I enjoy them. Unfortunately, there always seem to be off-the-board problems that make it more annoying than fun in so many cases. Fortunately (or unfortunately), I'm becoming better at being able to deciding to ignore all the gaming that's going on unless it affects me directly. This is unfortunate because it means I spend a lot of the event simply avoiding people who want to do nothing else but talk about, perpetuate or create the scandals.

Topics: chess