Blitz is inherently not to be taken very seriously. In forcing it into a competitive format, you can never get away from nonsense like this; we will just have to accept that these mini-travesties will happen without worrying about it too much.

Hi.

I saw some other situation with a video on it from Chessbase India but did not really look. In large blitz tournaments there are certainly quite often weird things happening, yes.

Kosteniuk's appeal should basically be dead on arrival. If there are disturbances player should pause the clock and notify the arbiter, who may then grant extra time to the player in order to compensate for her being disturbed. Obviously this needs to be done during the game though and not after.

Regards.
/ CbT

Hi.

The following curious case happened at the world blitz.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUfUwXo8NEs

Apparently some young players disturbed GM Adly and that is what made him lose on time, at least that was the claim. It's a bit unclear how the arbiter reasoning went but it looks like one of the arbiters might have seen at least how the spectators were positioned and deemed them close. The kid also argued his case horribly, but such can happen with young players. After much deliberation the decision was made that the game would continue with 2s given to Adly and him being forced to make the same move he made as he flagged.

There should really be a high threshold for the type of claim Adly made. How things were ultimately resolved is not so much an issue to me here; other are free to disagree. I think it's majorly in it's place to dissect how the case went though. This is supposed to be a world championship with high standards after all. Apologies in advance for the ranting nature this but it is what it is. I also wanna say it is a lot easier to sit and comment about complex interactions than to actually be involved. Anyway.

- It takes about 20s for the first "ok, can all players go away" to come (from the responding arbiter). This is then basically not enforced by anyone. I mean other arbiters get useful instead of just standing around doing nothing. Make a zone around the board. Put out chairs or bodies to block and signal lack of access if need be. If someone violates it just use your bloody authority as an arbiter (more like group of arbiters even) to keep them out. It is serious to disturb an ongoing arbiter situation.

- The chief organiser should be on site to monitor the situation and if no one else is he or she should take efforts to make sure the arbitrating situation can proceed. I'm very unclear about if he or she is.

- Players start arguing. It's normal for a bit of that and it's fine. But once this kid starts bringing up the same thing (they were far") again and again tell the guy "Ok. I have taken that into account you can stop repeating that. Do you have anything ELSE to say?".

- Players are allowed to argue on while judges deliberate. Dumb. Risks making the situation more infected, which makes it harder to resolve. With less calm players this could have been a lot worse.

- Norwegian tv randomly comes in at one point and starts interviewing . I wonder if how media access looks during heated situations has even been discussed. It does risk making things worse.

- Once the arbiters return a different arbiter from the one who was last involved notifies the players of the decision made. To me this is extremely basic. As much as possible keep the same arbiter doing the communication with the players. If the chief arbiter was called, for whatever reason as can happen, she is there until the end and basically assumes responsibility until the situation is resolved. She can say "ok I deem that my assistant arbiter can handle this", definitely, but once she gets involved she should be there until the end and actually lead the effort.

- The young player is allowed to argue when he is not happy with the decision.

- Some assistant arbiter is speaking randomly while this arguing about the decision is going on. I may step on some toes here, because I know Chessbase India did a video celebrating the arbitership of that specific arbiter, but that is doubtful arbitership. First of all if you interject anywhere make sure it's brief. Secondly make sure it's understandable and concise. Thirdly make sure you are being listened to. If it is doubtful all these criteria will be met then don't. The level of when to interject also goes up so much when you already have another arbiter handling the situation. It is extremely easy to undermine other arbiters in their work to try and resolve situations. Can also easily lead to drama between arbiters, which is the last thing you want.
It is very easy to say in hindsight, but to me if any other arbiter wanted to get involved it would best by done by signalling to both the arbiter and player simultaneously that the round needs to be finished (or something similar) just to try and prevent ongoing arguing between them.

- Norwegian TV comes in and starts interviewing the arbiter doing the decision communicating as well. Sort of tactfully, as they were waiting for a Russian speaking arbiter; but still.

- The kid asks for a Russian speaking arbiter. Probably to make his argument again. This delays the resolving of the situation. An arbiter or some kind of interpreter should ideally be on place already of course. He is not. It should seriosuly be considered to deny the kid this request. Access to same speaking arbiter is on a "if possible" basis asfaik. If it delays a blitz tournament, already delayed, by multiple minutes more that's a really strong argument for it being not possible. Also all that needs to be communicated to the kid is really "this is the decision", "this is what is going to happen". That is a few sentences at most. Literally tell kid those two things and ask "do you understand?". If he says yes, which he might based on general level of English previously shown, then hold him to that and start the game up without more discussion.

All this effectively meant the whole event was delayed for about one round. Not good.

Have a nice day.