Andrew Bak wrote:Congresses can choose not to let players enter or only allow them to enter if they play up a section if they want. As long as they don't discriminate on race, gender, sexual orientation etc, they can refuse entry for whatever reason.
Organisers can unwittingly get caught out should they have no prior knowledge of a player who apparently has a legitimate grade but also has a history of wildly fluctuating results over a series of many competitions.
Grade manipulation, if indeed that is happening, is not something organisers routinely guard against unless someone in the know alerts them to it and there is sufficient time to review a player's playing record. There is always the possibility that a suspected player has run into patch of good form as happens from time to time.
Refusing a player entry into a competition might be too confrontational and could result in a claim of discrimination of some form. A more likely outcome is that the organiser will move the suspected player to what he believes is a more appropriate section. The organiser would be advised to cover himself with a caveat in the rules stating that the organiser reserves the right to refuse entry or move a player to a different section.
A player might have suspicious of an opponent who turns out to be much stronger than he purports to be. The best thing is to the incident to the Arbiter or Organiser but be aware that at that in the middle of a competition it is most unlikely that they would be able to take any action. They might, however, to be more vigilant in other events they run.
It might be an idea for the ECF grader to offer some statistical checks on the results of graded games so that organisers have some information on the quality of published grades in addition to the basic A-F grade categories.