Adjournments and Adjudication

[Alex Holowczak]

OK, I make that three self-appointed spokespersons for the youth of today.

Ben has many connections to prominent players his age and younger. He claims that none of them like adjournments.

Rob is a leading English junior, and again knows many of his rivals personally. He claims none of them like adjournments.

I have comparatively few connections by comparison. My University team doesn't like adjournments, and nor did any of my school team when I imposed them upon them.

Short of dragging them all here to tell you what we've reported back from them, what will it take for you to take our word for it?

[Rob Thompson]

Not entirely sure about leading. Almost competent would be closer to the mark...

[Richard James]

I can imagine a no clock game to be a serious war of attrition - what if they made just one move per session and then kept coming back for weeks and weeks to play the same game, until the opponent was totally sick of wasting his time and resigned.

Yes, Joey, its called "Sitzfleisch" or "Sitzkreig".

To quote another correspondent on this forum, Richard James, or possibly his partner in crime, now passed away, Mike Fox:

The most boring games of all time? We turn to the London tournament of 1851, and the interminable encounters betwen Elijah (the Bristol Sloth) Williams and the deservedly unknown James Mucklow ('a player from the country' says the tournament book sniffily). Elijah introduced the concept of Sitzkrieg into chess: he'd sit there, taking two and a half hours or more on a single move until his opponent dropped from boredom. The tournament book records games in excess of twenty hours (one was adjourned after a whole day, at the end of the twenty-ninth move.) Mucklow (a much worse player) was no swifter, and when they got together it must have been like watching an oil painting. ('Both players nearly asleep,' recorded a drowsy secretary midway through one mind-numbing marathon.) Howard Staunton's commentary says it all: 'Each ... exhibits the same want of depth and inventive power in his combinations, and the same tiresome prolixity in manoeuvring his men. I tneed hardly hardly be said that the games, from first to last, are remarkable only for their unvarying and unexampled dullness.

Or again:

Another contender for the slowest player award might be Louis Paulsen; (according to some editions of The Guinness Book of Records he once took eleven hours over one move.) In mitigation, he was one of the greatest players of the nineteenth century. Still, he's worthy of note if only for an anecdote that made Bobby Fischer laugh for days. He was playing Morphy (one of the quickest players in history), and taking aeons over his move. Many leaden hours of silent cerebration ticked slowly by. Even Morphy, normally the acme of politeness, was constrained to remark: 'Excuse me, but why don't you make a move?' Paulsen came to with a jerk: 'Oh, is it really my move?' No wonder Morphy gave up chess.

That bit was Mike rather than me. Apropos of which, some years ago I was listening to an American folk music radio station when, much to my surprise, they started talking about Elijah Williams, referring to him as the Bristol Sloth. It transpired that the guitarist Leo Kottke had read about Williams in TCCA and wrote a piece called The Bristol Sloth in his honour. (Just in case anyone's interested it's on his 2004 album Try and Stop Me.)

As far as I know it was Mike who coined the sobriquet.

[Alex Holowczak]

Just had a mini-conversation with young friends online.

One person arrived home after a game and told us how he did. It was an adjournment. The non-playing person asked "What's the point? They could just go ask some amazing person at chess to tell them what to do", before saying "That's like cheating".

I'm going to go out on a limb and speak for other people again, and say that that's what most people outside of the game will think. They're immediately thinking negative things about the game of chess, simply by hearing about the concept of adjournments. It's hardly encouraging.

[Joey Stewart]

Here is my number 1 tip to you Alex - league management meetings award a vote to every person present, regardless of the club they are from. Therefore, if you can turn up with about 10 people (management meetings tend to be small affairs) and propose a change in the birmingham league rules that quickplay be the default time limit and adjournments are only allowed on individual agreement, then you would be quite likely to get it changed since you and your group will have the majority of the vote.

I have seen it done for pushing through controversial decisions in the Coventry league before.

[Roger de Coverly]

Here is my number 1 tip to you Alex - league management meetings award a vote to every person present, regardless of the club they are from.

I'd suspect that as the Birmingham league was the former stamping ground of the notoriously pedantic and legalistic jailbird and some of his colleagues and enemies, that such straightforward methods were long since outlawed.

[Joey Stewart]

Who are you talking about?

[Paul McKeown]

Ritson-Morry, perhaps, but BH Wood spelled the word, "gaolbird."

[Roger de Coverly]

Ritson-Morry, perhaps, but BH Wood spelled the word, "gaolbird."

It's amazing really how many feuds there were in the relatively small world of the British chess scene of the forties and fifties.
I'd guess that W R-M would have worded the Birmingham rules to make it virtually impossible that a gang of players could turn up at an AGM and disrupt the presumed smooth running of a league.

[Alex Holowczak]

Here is my number 1 tip to you Alex - league management meetings award a vote to every person present, regardless of the club they are from. Therefore, if you can turn up with about 10 people (management meetings tend to be small affairs) and propose a change in the birmingham league rules that quickplay be the default time limit and adjournments are only allowed on individual agreement, then you would be quite likely to get it changed since you and your group will have the majority of the vote.

I have seen it done for pushing through controversial decisions in the Coventry league before.

Won't work.

I tried to propose just such a rule change earlier this season, and I was told I could not propose it, it had to be a club delegate. So, I asked the club delegate to propose it on my behalf, but he couldn't because someone objected to even proposing it. In the end, another club took the case forward, and proposed it. It will be discussed at the League AGM.

However, the people who can vote there are limited to just the people who run each club (24 people) plus the President and a few other officers, taking the total vote to about 30. I'm allowed to attend and speak, but not vote. I don't believe 16/30 will support it; I think my club will vote against it due to the person who blocked it when our club tried to propose it. There are about 12 clubs who seem categorically opposed to the idea of quickplay finishes, and the others vary. However, 32 teams are AD, 29 are QP, and QP has been gaining ground on AD ever since they were proposed. But because of the voting structure, it hasn't a hope of passing, even though it's about 50/50.

The scales will tip in favour of QP within the next five years. It'll probably take another five to make the default quickplay, and probably another five on top of that to consign adjournments to history. (Only four seasons ago did we abolish the potential to have unlimited sessions for a game.)

[Alex Holowczak]

It's amazing really how many feuds there were in the relatively small world of the British chess scene of the forties and fifties.
I'd guess that W R-M would have worded the Birmingham rules to make it virtually impossible that a gang of players could turn up at an AGM and disrupt the presumed smooth running of a league.

Correct, the rules don't let that happen. They don't even let a gang of players propose a rule change, let alone vote for one!

[David Pardoe]

Joey, I note your suggested `tactics` for Birmingham league AGM changes.
Its a fairly common practice also up north...Ive seen it on various occasions.
Club officials from various clubs `collude` to try to either defeat or back particular motions that they share a view about.
It does mean that those who are keenest to get things done, and can be bothered to turn up at meetings, can short-cut the system, and sweep aside more `apathetic` elements. There is too much `passive silence/absence`, and not enough participation at such meetings, which often struggle just to be `quorate`. Yes, I`d urge more players to attend these and find out what is happening. Get the `minutes/agenda/reports`... from club officials/websites and have a read, and go to the meeting with questions prepared. Too many players just turn up for league matches and leave the rest to others to organise. Many posts require only a willing pair of hands to keep the wheels turning. And where long distances are involved, it might be possible to arrange an `e-meeting`, with emails being exchanged over several days, followed by voting/summary actions being agreed. These days, with free library internet access, there is no excuse for players not having access, setting up a `Hotmail` account free...lots of assistance is available from the library, and security is probably better than many `home` computers.

Regarding adjournments...there is something to be said for them.
Firstly, assuming you have a position that is worth adjourning, it provides a fascinating opportunity to actually play an endgame. It also provides an interesting opportunity to do some endgame analysis, and endulge in some chess study.
I`ve played a few, and even in positions that are `unfavourable`, it is very interesting to look and see what `resources` are available.
Quite often, on resumption, you soon diverge into variations you`d never have considered. And how many players can remember the `analysis` they did `off the board`, particularly if there are several possible lines. Importantly, there are various interesting tactics that can help with the adjournment situation.
The major downside is travel. If a match has to bee resumed, and the travel is significant, maybe players should have the opportunity to play at `neutral venues`. Alternatively, if the `away` player has trouble with travel, the `adjudication option` should be offered.

[Paul McKeown]

David,

What does "BRING BACK THE BCF" have to do with adjournments? (Admittedly, I can see it's connection with gerrymandered committee meetings and the like. ) Why not "BRING BACK CHILD CHIMNEY SWEEPS" or "BRING BACK THE BLACK DEATH" or "BRING BACK TRIAL BY ORDEAL" or something equally beneficial to general society?

Regards,
Paul McKeown

[Alex Holowczak]

That's his "signature", it appears on all his posts regardless of what he says.

Presumably, it's supposed to be used for things like "Regards, Paul McKeown", so you don't have to bother typing it. Yet still people type it.

Don't see the point of that too much in a forum environment, the name of the poster is already on-screen in two places near to the post you've just written anyway...

[Paul McKeown]

That's his "signature", it appears on all his posts regardless of what he says.

Presumably, it's supposed to be used for things like "Regards, Paul McKeown", so you don't have to bother typing it. Yet still people type it.

Don't see the point of that too much in a forum environment, the name of the poster is already on-screen in two places near to the post you've just written anyway...

Dear Alex,

I was delighted to receive your correspondence at 12:56 p.m., this inst., however, it leads me to feel that you took my previous correspondence at 12:26 p.m., this inst., too literally and without the necessary grain of curmudgeonly sarcasm.

My previous correspondence, addressed to the person of "David Pardoe," was written perfectly in the knowledge that his monniker, "BRING BACK THE BCF," was generated automatically. I did wish to question, though, whether or not such a signature appended to each of his postings aided communication on most threads, which on the face of it, generally have little to do with the perceived benefits of returning to a "British" rather than an "English" titled federation. My view, which I suppose I shall now have to spell out, is that whilst that may be David Pardoe's view, it doesn't generally help acceptance of his epistles, as it is a controversial opinion which rather demands the readers attention, particularly due to the capitalisation of the motto, every time one reads his posts, most of which have little, if anything, to do with the BCF.

I suppose that I shall now have to indicate sarcasm on every post which might employ such a curmudgeonly device with something like "[curmudgeonly sarcasm intended]".

I do wish you and yours the very best in all regards,
Yours sincerely,
Paul McKeown