Laos Round-Robins

[Alex Holowczak]

The ECF requires all players rated as ECF be members of the federation. It is a pity we did not collect those fees before they left the list!

In that case, suppose an Englishman overseas played a tournament rated as English, but was not a member of the ECF, would the ECF get in touch with FIDE to remove them from the list? If so, would FIDE do so? Would others' ratings have to be adjusted accordingly, or would the whole tournament be pulled from the ratings?

[IM Jack Rudd]

The other question is, given Laos's cavalier approach to ethics here, would they be willing to accept my transfer to them should I choose to change federation?

[Ian Thompson]

In that case, suppose an Englishman overseas played a tournament rated as English, but was not a member of the ECF, would the ECF get in touch with FIDE to remove them from the list?

As far as I am aware there is no FIDE requirement for players shown as English on the FIDE rating list to be members of the ECF. The FIDE requirement is that someone playing in a FIDE rated event has to be a member of a FIDE member federation. Neither the ECF nor FIDE has grounds for taking action against a player in the situation you describe.

[Geoff Chandler]

People believe anything.

The Corner has had a few fake tournament/league match reports in the past.

The last bogus report was the Paisley Open - won by Huigh Brechin
complete with fake games.

And even though in the final placings I had;

H.Potter, R.Starr and J.Lennon...etc. People believed it.

http://www.chessedinburgh.co.uk/chandle ... handID=263

And just last week I had Agatha Christie playing in and winning
the 1926 British Ladies Championships. That will soon become a fact.

http://www.chessedinburgh.co.uk/chandle ... handID=385

[Stewart Reuben]

Ian Thompson >As far as I am aware there is no FIDE requirement for players shown as English on the FIDE rating list to be members of the ECF. The FIDE requirement is that someone playing in a FIDE rated event has to be a member of a FIDE member federation. Neither the ECF nor FIDE has grounds for taking action against a player in the situation you describe.<

If that were their first event, as was tha case here, they should not masquerade as ENG, but use their adoptive federation. It is expensive to change federations once registered. For each active player registered as ENG, the ECF has to pay FIDE a certain sum per year, possibly 1 Euro currently. Why on earth would we pay that if the player made no contribution whatsoever?

Stewart Reuben

[Sean Hewitt]

As far as I am aware there is no FIDE requirement for players shown as English on the FIDE rating list to be members of the ECF. The FIDE requirement is that someone playing in a FIDE rated event has to be a member of a FIDE member federation. Neither the ECF nor FIDE has grounds for taking action against a player in the situation you describe.

Actually Ian, that's not correct.

Taken from http://www.englishchess.org.uk/archive1 ... /index.htm

It is a FIDE requirement that "to be included in the FRL or FIDE Rapidplay Rating list, a player must be a member of a national chess federation which is a member of FIDE" (FIDE Handbook B.02, paragraph 16.1). The ECF will only submit a game for FIDE rating if both players of the game are members of a national federation. It is essential that to enter FIDE rated events membership of the ECF is necessary for FIDE rating purposes.

This regulation meant that you had to be a member of your National Federation to have your rating published by FIDE. There has never been a FIDE regulation that said you had to be a member of your National Federation to play in a FIDE rated event. However the ECF twisted this particular regulation for their own purposes to justify their introduction of the rule that you had to be a member of the ECF to play in a FIDE rated event.

If there was any doubt about the meaning the next regualtion made it quite clear

It is the responsibility of the national federation to inform FIDE if players should not be included in the FIDE Rating List.
(FIDE Handbook B.02, paragraph 16.2)

However, of even greater interest is that, in looking for the correct wording on the FIDE website today I found that both 16.1 and 16.2 have been deleted and the rest of the paragraphs in this section re-numbered. This seems to suggest that they have removed the requirement to be a member of the ECF in order to have your rating published which, if true, further weakens the ECFs justification for their own rule.

By the way, I have no problem with the ECFs rule itself - I just wish they would be honest that they brought it for financial reasons (to force players in the 4NCL to be members of the ECF) rather than to comply with a FIDE regulation!

[Mike Truran]

Still, at least we're exempt from game fee (although when I asked for the exemption when the ECF imposed the mandatory membership rule on the 4NCL it still had to be agreed by the ECF board - I was made to feel like I was asking for a special favour and should be grateful for a gracious concession).

Hey ho. Plus ca change......

[Stewart Reuben]

Sean Hewitt >By the way, I have no problem with the ECFs rule itself - I just wish they would be honest that they brought it for financial reasons (to force players in the 4NCL to be members of the ECF) rather than to comply with a FIDE regulation!<

I was International Director at the time the rule came in that, for ENG players to be rated they had to be members of the ECF. At that time I never suggested it had anything to do with any FIDE Rule and was rather annoyed that it was suggested that this was the reason. That FIDE Rule was written by David Anderton when he was a member of the FIDE Executive in his own right, and is completely unworkable. How could FIDE ever establish whether a player was a member of any FIDE Federation? Anyway, all we would have needed was to make all FIDE Rated players members of the federation.

Others hid behind that FIDE Rule to justify our introduction of the requirement. I was always completely open about the situation. The ECF
Pays the FIDE dues.
Provides for the payment of the International Rating Officer, now Ray Ryan. His responsibilities include transferring the data, where appropriate, to the ECF Grading System.
Provides insurance cover for people representing the ECF internationally. This includes not just our top national teams, but also administrators, our representatives in the European Senior Team Championship, our players in Beijing in 2008, people who player in the European Individual Championship, people who play in the World Amateur, juniors who play in European or World events, etc.
In addition the ECF provides an essential umbrella for international events to take place.

I am pretty sure that all ECF active internationally rated players cost the federation money rather than the other way round since they are now also exempted from game fee. That can only be justified to the less active players if you believe, as I do, that playing internationally helps improve playing strength. It certainly cannot be justified purely on economic grounds.

Stewart Reuben

[Matt Mackenzie]

Let's not forget that this sort of thing isn't just confined to obscure Third World countries, now.......

Has that Romanian "grandmaster" had his title taken off him by FIDE yet??

[Stewart Reuben]

Matt >Has that Romanian "grandmaster" had his title taken off him by FIDE yet??<

That was a very revealing case. I was at the FIDE Meeting where it was virtually unanimous that he be stripped of his title. The only people against that seemed to be Campo and Kirsan. Kirsan even proposed that the Romanian play a match against Makro and, if he didnt lose it then he would retain his title. Makro would have none of that nonsense.

We learnt at the next meeting that Kirsan had reversed the Exective Board decision. Nobody said anything. I do't think the Romanian played again. He asked me to invite him to Hastings. I toyed with the idea, a free 2600 GM who would give away bundles of rating points. But rather quickly dismissed the idea.

Stewart Reuben

[Ian Thompson]

I toyed with the idea, a free 2600 GM who would give away bundles of rating points. But rather quickly dismissed the idea.
Stewart Reuben

Which reminds me of an American player I knew who was sufficiently well off that he has paid for several all-play-all GM tournaments and played in them himself (his rating being in the 2200-2250 range) because he likes playing against much stronger players than himself.

He has (had?) aspirations of getting the IM title and saw nothing wrong with arranging his own all-play-all IM norm tournament where he would invite players he thought were overrated (such as very old, inactive players), and players who played openings he liked to play against, to maximise his chances of getting a norm. (AFAIK, he hasn't actually arranged such a tournament.)

[Matt Mackenzie]

Erik Moskow??

[Stewart Reuben]

Indeed Erik did play in a number of events where he paid a very high entry fee.
I think it was Dietmar Kolbus who suggested to me we auction on ebay a place in the Hastings Premier, when it was still a round robin. Paul Buswell thought we shouldn't even have a minimum rating of 2200 to be in the spirit of the idea.

Stewart Reuben

[Sean Hewitt]

I was thinking of auctioning the last place in the Uxbridge Masters on ebay today. Typical that Stewart thought of it first!

[LozCooper]

Just had a quick flick through the England top 100 in the new January 2010 FIDE rating list and I came across Andrew Baxton (68th), Robin David (74th=) and Paul-Alexander Martins (79th=). All of these individuals have initial ratings of over 2300 from APA tournaments in Laos in recent months. It all looks a bit dodgy to me - am I right in this assumption?

I'm probably a bit late in reporting this but I'm pleased to say all three players have now been removed from the English rating list. Thanks to Phil, Sean, Nigel Short and anyone else who helped highlight the issue.