Roger de Coverly wrote:George Szaszvari wrote:
This one almost certainly. I don't think Tony had any decent move other than Ra4 in the final position, so the draw was agreed anyway.
Yes, that's it, thanks. The games between those two tended to be tense and interesting scraps as part of an ongoing
personal feud.
I believe such cases of confusion about the rules amongst GMs are due to the pressures they're under and not due to
ignorance or gamesmanship (with a few infamous exceptions.) Stewart Reuben can no doubt verify or correct me on
this belief. A well known illustration of tension doing strange things to a player was the 21st game of the 1974 Korchnoi
v Karpov candidates final in which Viktor had to verify with the ref that he could legally castle while his rook was
attacked! Anyone not knowing the background of that game might think "huh, how is it possible for a world class player
to not to know such a simple rule?" Viktor was quoted as saying afterwards that the tension got to him, and that he
could not recall ever having had such a situation in any of his games before... so doubts arose, even though he knew
the rules well enough, and Viktor needed the reassurance before he could continue.
Among non-GMs ignorance, or, worse, deliberate gamesmanship, were more frequently seen in my time. One example
was a well known (to older players at least) English player defending a difficult position in a game at one of the Mary
Ward Centre tournaments in London decided to offer me a draw in my thinking time (already a transgression) and in
due course, while I pondered his offer, the position, and my shortage of time, this guy shortly retracted his offer!
It was a beautifully timed and blatant piece of gamesmanship which one arbiter/controller (who didn't actually play
chess himself.. go figure that!) tried to to blow the whole problem away by ruling that the initial offer was illegal,
therefore everything that followed was irrelevant! Another arbiter present (a strong master well known to British
chess and these forums) saw what was happening, was evidently embarrassed by the behavior of my opponent,
someone well known to him, and suggested we agree to a draw. By then my frame of mind was hardly conducive
to continuing the game and my opponent continued to twist and turn every which way, playing the aggrieved one,
before settling on a draw. Episodes like that would put me off playing the game for a while. I guess my skin wasn't
thick enough at the time to deal with those kind of maneuvers.