What should happen in this situation?

[NickFaulks]

If I ever felt the desire to claim a game under these circumstances I'd know it was time to give up playing.

This thread has been turned around, as often happens, and is now about whether players should pounce on some technical infringement of the Laws to claim the game. It wasn't about that, it was about a particularly pernicious and blatant form of cheating in team chess. I am genuinely surprised by the widely expressed view that it really doesn't matter very much.

[Jonathan Bryant]

... given the state of the board, the clocks, and the match importance, I felt it was right to claim the game at the time, and just wanted to know what the rule book said.

I suspect the world would be a better place if people made claims based on their knowledge of what the rule book said. Not on what they wanted/hoped it said because of the state of the board/clocks/match importance.


As David Williams suggest above, there are all sorts of situations in which the rules are inadequate. There are even more where the rules might in theory be adequate if an arbiter was present but of course in league chess there isn’t (typically, at least).


Some years ago, I reach the time control in a league game and consider my next move. Time is called. My match captain comes over and says something like, "This looks pretty straightforward Jonathan. Push the d-pawn and it’s an easy win".

He had thought we were adjudicating and reflecting on what result to agree or whether we’d need a formal adjudication. Except we weren’t. We were adjourning and I was actually thinking about my move.

I can’t remember the match situation at this distance, nor the board position nor the state of the clocks. I’m reasonably sure it never crossed my opponent’s mind to claim the game, however.



As for Nick’s most recent comment, I don’t think people are saying the behaviour the OP experienced doesn't matter. It’s more a question of what you do about it. That’s how I read the comments, anyway.

[Alex Holowczak]

If I ever felt the desire to claim a game under these circumstances I'd know it was time to give up playing.

This thread has been turned around, as often happens, and is now about whether players should pounce on some technical infringement of the Laws to claim the game. It wasn't about that, it was about a particularly pernicious and blatant form of cheating in team chess. I am genuinely surprised by the widely expessed view that it really doesn't matter very much.

The reason is that it isn't a blatant attempt to cheat.

Knowing David Blower, he plays in the lower divisions of local leagues. At that level, it's far more likely to be a case of someone not realising that what they were doing was wrong, rather than cheating.

I think most people turn up to play league chess for a bit of fun, away from more serious competitions. So if you turn up for a bit of fun and start claiming games because of the clock press, I think Sean's point is that for him playing chess wouldn't be fun anymore.

[Alex Holowczak]

Some years ago, I reach the time control in a league game and consider my next move. Time is called. My match captain comes over and says something like, "This looks pretty straightforward Jonathan. Push the d-pawn and it’s an easy win".

He had thought we were adjudicating and reflecting on what result to agree or whether we’d need a formal adjudication. Except we weren’t. We were adjourning and I was actually thinking about my move.

I had a situation where I made the time control just before the quickplay finish, and I got up from the board to go to the toilet. I stopped to look at a lower board on my way out of the room. I then heard a team-mate of my opponent say to my opponent "What happens if you play this?" and picked a pawn up, and gestured with it. "What are you doing?" I shouted across the room, and as my opponent tried to bat him away, the team-mate realised he'd goofed and apologised. My opponent and I just shook our heads disbelievingly, laughed about it, and then I went to the toilet and upon my return continued the game as if nothing happened.

If even I'm not claiming wins in situations like these...

[NickFaulks]

It’s more a question of what you do about it. That’s how I read the comments, anyway.

Yes, but if the popular answer is "nothing", then the practice will flourish. It does not happen only in low level chess - I have witnessed it personally in an Olympiad match between big teams. Is that different?

By the way, if I were the player who had forgotten to press the clock and I realised that, but for the warning, I would possibly have lost on time, I would resign straight away. Giving advice is wrong, but so is taking it.

[David Williams]

The overall impression in this thread seems to be that it's bad form to claim a win when a team-mate or other spectator interferes. While I totally agree, surely the real point is that there is nothing in the rules that even remotely suggests that such a claim is valid.

[MartinCarpenter]

Had a silly version of this happen last season with someone 'whispering' a winning move for me to a fellow spectator. Difference here was that it was definitely unintentional - it was from a team mate of my opponent!
(And did definitely win very cleanly.).

It hadn't crossed my mind so I did try and find something else to play but there wasn't anything else half as efficient.... Then obviously pointed this out - clearly a completely genuine mistake.

[NickFaulks]

If even I'm not claiming wins in situations like these...

No, that's entirely different. In your case the advice offered to your opponent doesn't sound as though it was either welcome or helpful. In the case under discussion the advice offered was by definition very helpful and was presumably welcome, since the recipient immediately acted upon it to save his game.

[E Michael White]

.... Do NOT encourage them to claim on illegal moves: ..... Education (ex ducare - leading out) is our job.

Players and arbiters should always be required to play to the rules. The arbiter is required to award a loss or penalty time after an illegal move and the player should claim the same in an arbiterless event, as others in the event may also be affected by not doing so.

However I am impressed that you know the word education is not derived from the Latin word aedificare but believe you have mixed up educare with educere. You might have benefited from a more precise adherence to the laws of Latin grammar as well as the laws of chess.

[Michael Farthing]

It’s more a question of what you do about it. That’s how I read the comments, anyway.

Yes, but if the popular answer is "nothing", then the practice will flourish. It does not happen only in low level chess - I have witnessed it personally in an Olympiad match between big teams. Is that different?

Sadly, yes. They play for different reasons there. And it is from such unsporting like environments that the pressure for ever more detailed and gamesmanship enhancing laws are generated.

Aged 7, I managed to play hundreds of games with no clocks, no touch move, castling by touching the rook first, upside down rooks for queens and all sorts of other anathamae but remarkably few disputes. We observed the laws, but not the rules.

It was a childish ignorance,
But now 'tis little joy
To know I'm further off from Heaven
Than when I was a boy.

[NickFaulks]

So at what point are juniors to be told that giving advice to their teammates used to be ok but now they can't do it any more?

[Michael Farthing]

They should be told at the age of 8 years, 3 months and 4 days, except that if their birthday falls between January 1st and February 28th and the year is a leap year then they should be told at the age of 8 years 3 months and 3 days. Regardless of the junior's actual time of birth (including cases where the junior at the relevant date is situated in a different timezone from the one where he/she was born) instruction should be given as soon after 9.00am as is practical but in all cases before noon, both times local time, adjusted for daylight saving time or similar local conventions. In the event that a leap second occurs during this timeframe the leap second shall result in an increase of the time frame from 3 hours to 3 hours and one second.

HTH

[Alex Holowczak]

If even I'm not claiming wins in situations like these...

No, that's entirely different. In your case the advice offered to your opponent doesn't sound as though it was either welcome or helpful. In the case under discussion the advice offered was by definition very helpful and was presumably welcome, since the recipient immediately acted upon it to save his game.

I suppose. I still think I'd have carried on playing the game in this situation, but I wouldn't have been happy about it. I can imagine I'd get quite cross.

I think once I'd calmed down, I'd carry on the game. A 1 gamepoint penalty to the team is the probably appropriate penalty, because often the net result of that is that it voids the game in terms of the match score.

[Alex Holowczak]

It does not happen only in low level chess - I have witnessed it personally in an Olympiad match between big teams. Is that different?

Yes, it is.

If I'm umpiring Division Thirteen West of the Warwickshire Cricket League, I'm more lenient on things like wide tolerances, for example, than if I was umpiring a game in the Premier Division. If I wasn't, we'd have to abandon the game for bad light before the game finished, because so many extra balls would be bowled that we'd run out of light to play the game. Indeed, this is the practice advised when you go on the training courses.

But at least that benefits from having an umpire there, who can be consistent on this judgement towards both teams. The issue in league chess isn't so much the issue of these incidents occurring, but what to do when they occur. In an Olympiad an arbiter or three can make decisions based on what happened. In a league game, there isn't an arbiter to do that, and I think that's a more fundamental problem.

[Kevin Thurlow]

I played a league match many years ago, where I managed to get a bad position, so speeded up to encourage the opponent to make a mistake before adjudication. Luckily he speeded up as well, then his captain came over, looked intently at the position, then the clocks, then the score-sheet and said, "You don't have to play any more moves". The opponent stopped play. I claimed the game on the basis that the opposing captain had cheated. The opposing captain admitted what he had done and the League decided that he had cheated and they would punish him by telling him not to do it again. I asked the league if any of the laws of chess/league rules were going to be imposed in future. They did not answer.

I think it is entirely correct to claim the game in such circumstances.