A question about noise during a match

[andrew martin]

This whole affair is very strange. It is odd in the first place that in a club match an arbiter should need to be present ( what sort of league are we referring to) and that secondly such a ridiculous decision should have been made. What sort of opponent claims the game under these circumstances and what sort of idiot upholds the claim? No ECF or Scottish Arbiter I know of as the standards are uniformly high.

I suppose as a theoretical question it may have been OK, but names and places are involved.

[Andy Howie]

I can understand why anyone would want to refute direct allegations, but I can't see that any were really made. The "arbiter" of the match in question would have in effect been the team captain(s). I wonder if anyone can produce a list of team captains for each of the Bon-Accord teams - and their opponents for the years in question.

Not the captains but I can give you all of the results and who played in each game Bon Accord played for the period mentioned. It is all visible on the Chess Scotland Website and in the public domain.....

[Dave Roberts]

This whole affair is very strange. It is odd in the first place that in a club match an arbiter should need to be present ( what sort of league are we referring to) and that secondly such a ridiculous decision should have been made. What sort of opponent claims the game under these circumstances and what sort of idiot upholds the claim? No ECF or Scottish Arbiter I know of as the standards are uniformly high.

I suppose as a theoretical question it may have been OK, but names and places are involved.

I'm not even sure if it was an Arbiter - he was the person to whom my opponent made the claim. I'm not sure of his name. This certainly is not the direction I expected this to go at all - I just wanted to know what the English rules were. I did not initially mention names or even countries - I probably should have just ignored the person's questions about where and when it happened.

[Andy Howie]

David,

Putting my serious head on. I can assure you that no one in Chess Scotland is out to attack you. There were concerns raised about the incident that you raised as quite simply it should not have happened. It was totally wrong and goes against everything we try to do as arbiters.

Unfortunately the name John was mentioned and Arbiter. As John Clifford is the only John who is an arbiter up there, he naturally felt that he needed to clarify and defend the assertion that it was not him that was involved.

From your later comments, it is obvious that this happened in a league match and the "arbiter" was in fact a team captain. A team captain should not be making such a decision and you would have been well within your rights to appeal the result.

Please do not be offended by posts that have been made, I think you will find that most of them are because we are incredulous that someone could do it. It is not the norm, in fact this is the first time I have ever heard of this in my time as an Arbiter.

If you feel uncomfortable about any of the posts here, please contact Carl or Jack. Likewise if you are uncomfortable with anything that has been said on the Chess Scotland noticeboard, please contact me

Please do not let this affect your return to chess. We are not a bad lot (honest ). In the unlikely event that something similar happens, do not accept it and complain to the relevant people. I would be very surprised if any league committee accepted a complaint such as this

Please feel free to contact me if you have any other concerns about up north

Regards

Andy Howie
Executive Director
Chess Scotland

[Dave Roberts]

David,

Putting my serious head on. I can assure you that no one in Chess Scotland is out to attack you. There were concerns raised about the incident that you raised as quite simply it should not have happened. It was totally wrong and goes against everything we try to do as arbiters.

Unfortunately the name John was mentioned and Arbiter. As John Clifford is the only John who is an arbiter up there, he naturally felt that he needed to clarify and defend the assertion that it was not him that was involved.

From your later comments, it is obvious that this happened in a league match and the "arbiter" was in fact a team captain. A team captain should not be making such a decision and you would have been well within your rights to appeal the result.

Please do not be offended by posts that have been made, I think you will find that most of them are because we are incredulous that someone could do it. It is not the norm, in fact this is the first time I have ever heard of this in my time as an Arbiter.

If you feel uncomfortable about any of the posts here, please contact Carl or Jack. Likewise if you are uncomfortable with anything that has been said on the Chess Scotland noticeboard, please contact me

Please do not let this affect your return to chess. We are not a bad lot (honest ). In the unlikely event that something similar happens, do not accept it and complain to the relevant people. I would be very surprised if any league committee accepted a complaint such as this

Please feel free to contact me if you have any other concerns about up north

Regards

Andy Howie
Executive Director
Chess Scotland

Hi Andy,

thank you very much for this response. I am still in shock about all of this - I had thought this topic had died a while ago as I had received the answer I needed. Then when I received Carl's message that there were some posts here that I may want to respond to, I was amazed to find that I was being accused of a number of things, including that my name is not actually Dave Roberts. I was considerably more surprised to find that I was being discussed on the Chess Scotland's forum. I was also somewhat frustrated to learn that I wouldn't be able to respond as quickly as I should have liked. In this light, my responses may have been harsher than they should have been. I'm sorry for that.

I in no way wanted to impinge upon the integrity of John Clifford or the Bon Accord Club or Chess Scotland as a whole. I really just wanted to know what would happen in England. For not making this clear enough I also apologise. While I remember the actually event, the details have gotten clouded (or suppressed ) over the years. I am also very grateful for all of the support I've received here.

Kind regards,

Dave Roberts

[Carl Hibbard]

Nice to see a good (and positive...) response from everyone and I now consider this matter closed

And now for something completely different

[Peter Rhodes]

I wonder if anyone can produce a list of team captains

Not the captains but I can give you all of the results

Hi Andy, I suspected not. Perhaps I and others assumed something very different and arguably very obvious from the initial details.

The poster said he was playing for a club and it was obvious to me that when he was using the word arbiter he was using it in the simple sense of someone who was acting in a position of authority. I would never expect to see a team game have an actual real and dedicated arbiter and it's common knowledge that the team captains stand in as arbiters for these types of matches.

I can see why some people might jump to other conclusions regarding the identification and covering their backsides. Personally I thought that the claim that the story was an "outright lie" was unhelpful.

I guess there is a lesson to learn from all of this, and that is when recounting controversial chess stories - it is easier to use the phrase "some bloke with a beard" rather than first names !

It's nice to see that everyone has now "kissed and made up"

[Geoff Chandler]

Hi Dave,

I did not call you a liar mate, just got the dates mixed up.

I'm afraid I see the funny side of everything and the chess forums are full
of leg-pulls and wind ups.

Not so much on this site I have to admit. Some forget it just a game.
A brilliant and beautiful game...but it's just a game.

So your tale was so incredible and such a breath of fresh air, it just had to be a gag.
Sorry I got it wrong. No harm intended.

I can assure you nobody in Scotland thinks you are a liar.
Most probably thought it was gag.

(perpertrated by me, as I get tend to get the blame for everything).

Welcome back to Chess and Good Luck.

Geoff

[Alex McFarlane]

I don't want to re-open this other than to state the obvious that I am glad that it is resolved.

I do want to slightly disagree with Peter however. In a league match it is both match captains who usually act as arbiters, so when I, and others, see that the arbiter was asked we assume a third party was invited to get involved. This is not an infrequent occurence. On several occasions I have been asked to clarify the Laws, even 'ruling' against my own clubmate on more than one occasion. Many arbiters are asked to get involved in the hope of settling the dispute on the night.

THe obvious question that now seems to have been missed (and lead to me incorrectly assuming an arbiter WAS involved) is "What was Dave's captain doing during this dispute?"