had gone way off but I really cannot allow comments by Roger go unanswered.
I had gone through point by point many things which he simply ignored.
http://www.ecforum.org.uk/viewtopic.php ... 75#p134634
Accordingly I offer a comprehensive rebuttal of his later incorrect assertions.
Firstly as regards the comment
Well I would venture to suggest that actually Roger has been reduced to soundbites, mainly in the face of a torrent of information and evidence that he could not have been expected to have knowledge of and insight about. Or as he might say. Ah that's all just a rant.John McKenna' wrote: Roger's reply to Colm is more substantial
Rant or no rant, the facts are still the facts. I might retort this is a case of Roger the Dodger, evasion being the better part valor?
Yes indeed Roger, so why did YOU bring up this topic?Roger de Coverly wrote: It's one of the few things known about Irish chess, namely one individual perpetually ranting on the Internet against the establishment and his fellow players and this has been going on for how long? Is it twenty years?
http://www.ecforum.org.uk/viewtopic.php ... 75#p134615
And in doing so, only confirm that you actually know and understood very little about what went on and the issues involved. Which is only to be expected really. I would never claim to know the first thing about for example the Murray Chandler – Nigel Short issues of 1994 other than on a superficial level.
I mean, sure I read stuff about it at the time and since, I think I even had some light banter with Murray Chandler about it in a lift at the Hotel Cosmos in the Moscow Olympiad in 94, but as I could not know or be privy to details I keep an open mind and accept that really, I might as well know nothing. Much like what would really be the situation regarding your knowledge and insight about Irish recent chess history. Limited, and skewed.
When there is a divergence from your knowledge, understanding and point of view presented to you, then it becomes a rant? Well, when someone who actually knows what they are talking about- because they actually lived it- takes the trouble to address many of the incorrect notions someone such as yourself has, the best you can do is to, in effect, figuratively speaking, put your hands over your eyes and ears and say; I am not listening nah nah nah. You are better than this for sure. But are you capable of considering that you just might have things wrong and not be nearly as well informed as you think you are?
I would certainly not expect you or anyone else to just go along with what I alone write, which was why I gave you a link to an independent and well regarded person's report on just some of the absurd nonsense that went on. That sort of sample nonsense is offered to point out that the ways some things were done and show that it was indicative of a far greater malaise, which was sometimes quite sinister.
http://irishchesscogitations.com/pdf/se ... s_2000.pdf
I would be just as content to never waste time on such nonsense. And it would be only SOME fellow players who were, and still are, part of cliques that I, AND MANY OTHERS within Irish chess were at odds with, I fully admit to being the most vocal and persistent of players who were unhappy with the way things were being done then, and ever since. For the most part people have simply moved on. And for me this is merely a sort of academic exercise.
I certainly could plead insanity having observed some of the lunacy that went on, and still does! Even to this day there remain fundamental differences of opinions on many legacy issues between players – though these differences do not, for the most part, present any problems. As you rightly say, at this remove, who cares about what happened so long ago. It can often be like the Fawlty Towers thing of- don't mention the war.
It is also often the case that when some people gain from a particular status quo their silence and compliance is assured. That could have been a path for me to have chosen. It was certainly made clear to me that was what was desired by certain people, but that was just not my way. And I paid a huge price in terms of the usual sort of stuff that one expects to see happen with a whistle-blower. I have been vilified, misrepresented for years. I am no angel that is for sure, and, as is so apparent, I can, and do, give as good as I get. But I pride myself on trying to be fair and accurate. If someone points out flaws in either fact or views I am all eyes and ears.
But fact is that there are a great many who would back up and agree with my versions of events, and in any case, my rallying against many wrong things did yield many positive results in terms of reforms and this has allowed for better practice and more scrutiny of the way certain things get done.
While it is true that I have indeed been at odds with what you might call the establishment I also became very much part of that establishment, on and off, in part because most, if not all, of my views in relation to some of what had gone in Irish chess were vindicated. But these thing go in cycles and even now there are absurd things going on behind the scenes. Mr Baburin just recently being appointed back on an ICU selection sub committee, which is not of any great significance other than just being plain wrong!
That committee was fine with three people, but old habits die hard and now.... Well now we have situation in which a player on the team is also a selector and while that is bad practice in of itself, Baburin has an awful record of being a selector. I mean awful!
As in, should have resigned when decisions he was party to were overturned. But nope despite the whole farce the only person to resign from that shameful selection committee was the now deceased, and greatly missed, giant of Ulster Chess, Tom Clarke.
The rest of them never resigned [as would be standard practice] and two of them were on the same selection committee 9 years later in 2009 when they tried and failed to deny me my rightful place on the 2010 Olympiad team. The great irony being that I had no intention of accepting my Olympiad place that year, but when they tried, yet again, to screw me over I then not only made sure to take my place, but I went on to the ICU executive and served for three years.
Those same two selectors were both also signed up to go to the 2010 Olympiad – Baburin as board one, and Gerry Graham as team captain, but wouldn't you know, that as soon as I got my rightful place back on the 2010 team they both coincidently withdrew from the team, for whatever fantasy reason they gave, when anybody clued in to Irish chess knew the real reason was because I had yet again thwarted their plans. The team might as well of had a party, such was the positive effect for the whole Irish delegation and experience.
Likewise when I was the team Captain in 2012 Baburin not only did not take the place offered to him, but in a nasty and stupid email sent by him declared that
“I will not be playing in the next Olympiad. I was going to take part, but I am not impressed with the new captain."
and he went on to make some other spurious, insincere and irrelevant noises about not wanting to open old wounds- which is exactly what he just did, by sending such a nasty email, instead of just declining his place.
Only his die hard supporters believe he ever had any intention to go to the 2012 Olympiad, for one thing his close friend Mark Heidenfeld was not available for the 2012 Olympiad.
So it is just dandy that he [Mark] this year is not only available for this Olympiad but has accepted an offer to play this year. Which brings me back to more reasons why it is crazy for Baburin to be a selector yet again.
He is wide open to suggestions of conflict of interest, and already there are alarm bells ringing because his close friend Mark Heidenfeld has been offered a place on the team ahead of Stephen Brady, the 2011 Irish Champion - who actually is entitled to an automatic place, save for the fact that the ICU have decided to ignore their own rules and a motion passed at the 2010 AGM - David Fitzsimons and Ryan Griffiths, two of our most promising younger players, who I would really have liked to see on the team. And the key point here is that unless I am mistaken, it is the case that if there is a less than 50 point difference in rating then the selection committee could opt to pick say for example a player rated 2301 as opposed to a player rated 2350. They have such discretion.
In the scenario here we have Ryan, David and Stephen all within that 50 rating points but of course Mark, who has been living in Germany since around 2007 or 2008 I think, but did make a point of playing enough games here in Ireland to remain eligible for selection, getting the nod owing to having the highest rating. But while I have to say that Mark is a fine team mate and a great asset to any Irish team, I am sort of sad to think he would be selected ahead of David or Ryan. My point would be that Mark has done nothing of note in Irish chess [or anywhere] within the last few years- he had a good 2010 Olympiad I think, [certainly performed better than me]
For one thing David and Ryan are the future, and players like me, Baburin, Heidenfeld arguably would better serve Irish chess by not accepting places on the team- It is arguable at least. Not saying that it is right, just a worthwhile consideration. I understand the Chinese have a policy to rotate in favour of new younger players coming in as soon as they are strong enough. In other words, people of my age should not, as you suggest, be able to simply bank on a holiday to an Olympiad every two years. I agree strongly with that suggestion, and it is a pity that you mistakenly have things upside down and back the front as regards my stance on Olympiads.
The only defence I offer of myself is that I feel I have earned my place on the team by participating in, and managing to win the Irish ch, even if I was lucky or perhaps not so impressive as in previous years, I think my very participating helped the event and thus Irish chess, plus in all reality, the likelihood of my performing much different from anyone else who would have been on the team is not great. I may perform as well, better than or worse than Ryan or David, Stephen, Mark but in the case of having two young and hungry players on the team then arguably that is better for the team and Irish chess. On the other hand one might say too bad for David that he lost a game he should have against me at the 2013 Irish ch and too bad for Ryan that he was not able to play.
As a curious but related aside- When I turned up at the 2000 Olympiad in Istanbul after I was rightly restored to a correct place on the team, one of Baburins friends and our fellow team mate [there were three Marks on the team that year all good friends with Baburin, but no need or point to say which one actually said this to me] ,actually explained to me that I was unreasonable to expect that he would not try screw me over as best he could as a selector and do his best to keep me off the team!
Yep you got that right, it was only natural that Baburin have every right to screw over a player because that player had previously made a principled objection to him being on the team 4 years previously [Baburin did not take his place on the 1998 team- might of had something to do with me being on the team that year too!- Or because being held in the Russian federation it was a bit risky or something?] I think I was on the team because I was Irish champion that year too, but then considering I ended up board two to Brian Kelly, no I think my rating was about 3rd 4th or 5th in the country at the time?
Anyway while I cannot say for sure that Baburin would use his position as a selector in an improper or less than ideal manner, and one has to assume that the selectors done their best without fear or favour. I think common sense and good form would indicate that the perception of conflict of interests was very real and thus he should not have been offered this position, and he would have been better advised not to accept the position. If he was a retired Olympiad team player then at least then he could not be open to any suggestion of bias so easily.
As if to underscore the point, about potential cliques and holidays every two [few] years. It is amusing to note that the same person who originally brought Baburin to Ireland [For unlike your earlier reference, he was not just a Russian GM who happened to emigrate here,no it was arranged and planned ] and helped to set him up here, is the same person who was up until Mark left Ireland, the employer of Mark Heidenfeld and the current ICU Fide delegate, by now you might have just started to see certain patterns. Mark, Eamon and Alex are sort of a trinity really. They would very much like and enjoy an Olympiad Holiday, if not every two years then just every few years!
Though it is also worth saying that 30 or 31 people have signed a request for an EGM to actually change the ICU Fide delegate just for the duration of the Fide congress in Norway.
To me anyway, he has always come across as someone who used to think he had an automatic right to an Olympiad holiday every two years and resents anyone like Baburin who might challenge it.
This is just comical. You just ignore the whole point and reality of it all and my previous post specifically mentioning and explaining that far from resenting anybody knocking me of a team fair and square, I pointed out that this was not the case at all. I am not someone who used think I had an automatic right to anything. I would been on any team only having earned my place. But yes I sure as hell resent the fact that in my mind [and many others] I have no doubt that Baburin did indeed try keep me off the team as a selector and wronged me on many occasions and in many ways.
Nowadays we have a perfectly civil mutual disregard for one another and there really are no reasons for alarm in any way shape or form. We are never going to agree about much of anything and certainly not the absurd shenanigans that went on over the last 20 years.
As sort of détente approach is my philosophy and we are both at an age in which we have to accept that life is too short for this nonsense and somehow work around differences. We all have good and bad qualities and attributes.
Lastly, when someone is accused of ranting I usually find that can be the first sign of someone out of their depth on a topic. There are a great many things I would gladly defer to you on, but recent Irish chess history that I have lived through, and continue to live through is not going to be one of them.
I hope you enjoyed this rant.