Candidates Matches 3rd - 27th May 2011

[Mick Norris]

One can almost sense Malcolm Pein's relief that he had already dropped out of the running for organising the final.............

Anand v any of the 4 semi-finalists does not spark the imagination. At least if either Grischuk or Kramnik gets through it is likely sponsorship will be forthcoming for the final.

I can't imagine Malcolm would hope for Topalov to qualify, the Azeris and Armenian would have seen home bids come through I guess

If Kamsky wins, you might expect the Americans to make a decent bid - they saw last time that they didn't support him and he ended up in Bulgaria

The Russians might well make a bid for Grischuk or Kramnik, but I thought Kramnik would get more bids than any of the remaining 4, given he has a history, and good contacts in Germany, England, France to name but 3

Maybe the Indians will finally get a bid together

[Mick Norris]

In a quite magnificent piece of chess punditry, then, it appears that I managed to get all four results wrong in my earlier predictions!

In that case, please predict the semis and we can bet on whoever you think will lose

[Alex McFarlane]

I believe there will be a press release tomorrow from the Chief Arbiter about the clock incident. That should clarify the situation. It would therefore not be correct for me to say anything until that time other than that I was very glad I was in charge of the other game!!!

[LozCooper]

One can almost sense Malcolm Pein's relief that he had already dropped out of the running for organising the final.............

Anand v any of the 4 semi-finalists does not spark the imagination. At least if either Grischuk or Kramnik gets through it is likely sponsorship will be forthcoming for the final.

One senses that an 8 game match would have produced at least 2 different semi-finalis

Give that Vladimir Kramnik has been invited to both London Chess Classics I can't see him having any objections to Anand v Kramnik.

[Simon Ansell]

When you have a completely drawn position with seconds each on the clock to win a match vs Kramnik and you have an unscheduled break for ten minutes, who's head isn't going to go in that spot??

In such a situation a competent arbiter (and all three of them are competent) will try to ensure that both players have refocused before asking them to continue play.

It didn't work out for the unfortunate Radjabov in this instance. He seems to have gone badly wrong immediately after the resumption.

I wasn't having a go at the arbiters, there's really not much they can do in that situation and it's just incredibly unfortunate for Radjabov. I just think it's a consequence of the ridiculous format of these matches.

[Alex McFarlane]

Seems to have been repeated somehow. So I've deleted the second one

[Mick Norris]

Report with picture of Alex telling everyone to keep quiet
http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=7206

[Sean Hewitt]

Report with picture of Alex telling everyone to keep quiet
http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=7206

Thanks for that Mick. I wonder why it took 13 minutes to resume the game? One would expect spare clocks to be on hand, and for the arbiters to know how to set them. I'm surprised that any delay was more than a minute or so.

[Roger de Coverly]

Thanks for that Mick. I wonder why it took 13 minutes to resume the game? One would expect spare clocks to be on hand, and for the arbiters to know how to set them. I'm surprised that any delay was more than a minute or so.

Alex's report at Chess Scotland goes into more detail.
http://scotchess.s4.bizhat.com/scotches ... 11-15.html

They felt it right to reset the times exactly, so they had to review the video footage and game transmission.

I think it had been reported previously, that DGT clocks spontaneously reset themselves. Speculation was that this could be attributed to vibration arising from a particularly strong clock press, so that the electrical connections were temporarily disconnected.

[Mick Norris]

Interesting that it was a substitute clock that failed, but no idea how you stop this sort of equipment failure

[David Sedgwick]

Interesting that it was a substitute clock that failed, but no idea how you stop this sort of equipment failure

I think that it being a substitute clock was simply a coincidence. The arbiters would have had a number of clocks and have tested them all beforehand. The batteries in one clock were starting to run low and it was replaced. The replacement was no more likely to fail subsequently than any other clock would have been.

[David Sedgwick]

Thanks for that Mick. I wonder why it took 13 minutes to resume the game? One would expect spare clocks to be on hand, and for the arbiters to know how to set them. I'm surprised that any delay was more than a minute or so.

Alex's report at Chess Scotland goes into more detail.
http://scotchess.s4.bizhat.com/scotches ... 11-15.html

They felt it right to reset the times exactly, so they had to review the video footage and game transmission.

Alex's report, supplemented by a private email to me, indicates that a significant cause of the delay was a call by one of the players for the game to be annulled.

[Mick Norris]

I believe there will be a press release tomorrow from the Chief Arbiter about the clock incident. That should clarify the situation. It would therefore not be correct for me to say anything until that time other than that I was very glad I was in charge of the other game!!!

Any sign of the Press release?

[David Sedgwick]

I believe there will be a press release tomorrow from the Chief Arbiter about the clock incident. That should clarify the situation. It would therefore not be correct for me to say anything until that time other than that I was very glad I was in charge of the other game!!!

Any sign of the Press release?

The report which has now appeared on the homepage at http://kazan2011.fide.com/ contains some comment on the matter which is "official" in tone:

"A few seconds left, and Vladimir was trying his best to find the way out. The draw seemed to be inevitable, when the clock condescended. In accord to the Attachment 1 of the Candidates Matches Regulations (Article 6.10), the Arbiter changed the clock, returned the time, guided by live broadcasting of the game, and the grandmasters resumed playing. In the end, Kramnik won the game."

[Mick Norris]

Further info here
http://www.chessvibes.com/reports/candi ... more-38191

Kramnik: “Any professional will tell you that objectively it’s in favour of the weaker side. Though that’s not how it worked out. It’s absolutely obvious that it wasn’t in my favour. I was very unhappy about it, and there were witnesses. I thought that deprived me of any chances whatsoever.”