Photo by Sergey Sorotkin
I received countless emails and messages about the cheating accusation scandal at the Aeroflot Open in Moscow. According to some of the eyewitnesses, Kurnosov did not go to the bathroom. He went to the hall way (smoking area) to smoke (as in the picture above).
I understand Mamedyarov’s frustration. However, I have not seen any concrete evidence to support the cheating claim.
In my opinion, FIDE must address this issue promptly. FIDE must also have clear rules and they MUST enforce these rules. We cannot have different rules for different players.
If someone is caught cheating, he/she MUST be severely punished. However, FIDE must also have clear rules to punish players who claim their opponents cheat without substantiated evidence. I believe he/she did it is not enough.
We cannot have players claiming that their opponents cheat after every loss. This would be chaos and very bad for chess. After all, players’ reputations are at stake. I would hate to see players devote their lives to the game only to have their reputations ruined forever because of baseless accusations.
According to International Arbiter Gijssen the search of Kurnosov’s jacket pockets only came up with a pack of cigarettes, a lighter and a pen.”
I was not there and I have no factual knowledge of what actually happened. The reputation of both Mamedyarov and Kurnosov are stake. That is why it would be irresponsible for me to offer my judgment without full information. I can only report of what I have been told so far.
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Once again, here is the letter by Mamedyarov to Mr. Bakh:
To: The organizer of the AEROFLOT-OPEN tournament Alexander Grigorievich Bakh
From: GM Shakhriyar Mamedyarov
Explanation of my protest
Dear Alexander Grigorievich,
On 22.09.2009 the game between myself and Igor Kurnosov was played.
During the game my opponent went out of the playing hall after each move, took his coat and withdrew himself on the toilet. After suspicion of unfair play on move 14 I offered a draw, he refused. We quickly played 11 moves, on the 12th move I played a move which confused my opponent. The next moves from him were given as first choice by Rybka, which quickly allowed him to win the game.
Due to this series of suspicions, having to do with the unusual behaviour of my opponent, Igor Kurnosov, I hereby lodge a protest and refuse to continue participation in the tournament.
I hope that this kind of situation will not occur in the future.
Sincerely,
GM Shakhriyar Mamedyarov
Chessvibes has a piece about this situation here.
Move 16. … Qd6 (the first new move in this game) is not a Rybka move!
Rybka plays Nxb2.
I suppose this is a big mistake by Mamedyarov. He is frustrated in general because there is no way for him to come to the top.
Forget it.
GM Shakhriyar Mamedyarov has shown very bad sportmanship !
Why didnt he raise his suspions to the arbiter during the game ?
Nothing but bad sportmenship here. Fide should impose some sort of ban on him.
Is ther ever any need to shout in block capitals?
People who smoke should be sentenced as ones who deal drugs. Life jail or death penalty.
“Strict rules are needed NOW!”
Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaaha.
And who’se going to make them???????????????????????
Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaaha.
Arbiter Gijssen should be banned from chess tournaments with more than 10 people playing. He has repeatedly shown that she can’t keep control of the chess mob.
I am advocating the following rule since long time.
“Players should be at the table for the whole game. They can go to the toilet once for every hour of play.”
This doesn’t mean they have to go on the hour, it means that if the game lasts for 6 hours, then they can leave the table maximum 6 times – whenever they wish. I think one toilet break per hour is enough. Even if the persons drinks a lot during the game, he doesn’t really pee more than once per hour.
If the player needs to stretch his legs, then he can stand up and walks a little, but in proximity of the table.
I see no other reasons why a player should leave the table.
Chess should be played at the table, not from the toilets, relaxation box, smoking area, etc.
‘I am advocating the following rule since long time.’
And you haven’t learnt anything after such a long wait?
‘I see no other reasons why a player should leave the table.’
For SMOKING, are you deaf? And asking friends about what to play.
STOP bothering the chess players once and for all!!! Clean up the chess mafiosos around them.
Must agree to some extent with 2nd & 3rd posters.
Otherwise, it’s quite difficult to judge how suspicious black’s play is, when I have some 500+ elo points less than Kurnosov.
Had he really played Nxb2!? then – yeah! – I’d be with Mamedyarov. But even 20..Bg4! had not to foresee, actually. It’s so difficult to say what combination one can, or cannnot to find without a computer in a single game. Again the best counterargument is probably that why a young GM who has made steady progress last years would endanger his whole chess-career by cheating.
Or has he done that all the way!?
But it’d be interesting to see used times for each move, if black really left the board “after every move”.
Why people write to Polgar? Maybe because she is very kind person who seems to have always a minute to youngs & other lesser players.
She does great work (for free!) for chess. Here and in real world.
Yup. Start with Gijssen and all other fide arbiters.
‘Why people write to Polgar? Maybe because she is very kind person who seems to have always a minute to youngs & other lesser players.’
That’s ok, but why would they write to her about anything and everything, when she is no position to make new rules, nor to punish players for misbehaving??
(Why people write to Polgar)
Heh, why are WE here? (unless you came just to troll)
People like to discuss about things. Next we can move to Peter’s blog, next to Mig’s… and nothing we talk won’t chance anything. So?
And I don’t really know from what kind of people Susan got the email she mentioned (of course I don’t).
I checked the game with a chess programm and it seems, that 16.Rd4 was a bad move by Mamedyarov – perhaps 16.Rh4 is better –
a possible continuation:
16…Qd6 17.Bxg7 Rxg7 18.Qxh5 Bd7 19.Rxe4 Qb4 20.Rd2 Qc5 21.Rd1 Rxg2
-> in this position White is a pawn down, but still got chances (in my opinion)
I think, Shak should ask himself, why he played such a strange and risky opening against such a strong GM who got 2600 Elo – he didnt surprise his opponent who obviously knows this position very well…
I have posted more-thorough test runs and analysis on my website here.
I’ve posted them also here in Mig’s blog, following Mig’s own comment with his own test runs.
Here’s my conclusion: no evidence of cheating, at least as far as my stat stuff is relevant.
As with Elista 2006 (game 2 especially), the game itself *causes* a higher match rate, which triggers “confirmation bias” of suspicion based on behavior, but proper understanding of what’s going on *statistically* is needed to keep things from going up in smoke—or out for a smoke in Kurusonov’s case.
Bothering chess players???
They are too spoiled. Compare chess players with other sports and their “rights”. Tell me in which sport the players can leave the playing field at any time and go to the toilet or smoke a cigarete???
Chess players need to grow up and act like professionals. then and only then the money will come and they won’t have to play for peanuts like they are doing now.
I mean look at the press conferences at Topalov vs. Kamsky match and the players attitude towards the press. Thats supposed to help marketing chess and make it more popular??? It’s a disgrace and is actually anti-propaganda for chess.
Chess players needs to get their act together.
Game 5 of Topalov-Kamsky has started. Won’t it be covered here?
I am just wondering why in the middle of the game the player has to leave the table after each move (how many times has he left the table?). The guy is playing a 2700+ player. Is the hallway empty of spectators? Is there possibility of communicating (i.e. conversing/sign language, etc) with other players or spectators in the hallway? What about the rest room? Who goes in and out of the place? Is it open to all players and spectators alike? From the pic, it seems like the background is a stairway. Very dubious activity.
I have no idea whether there is anything to these cheating allegations but this is hardly the first time that a controversy has arisen over bathroom breaks in chess either at the top level (Topalov/Kramnick), at CCA events (Philadelphia) or at scholastic tournaments. Maybe there should be metal detectors outside bathrooms. I also tend to agree with the poster who said that chess players are spoiled. Unlimited smoking breaks? What other professional or even amateur endeavour allows unlimited smoking breaks? Maybe bathroom breaks every hour is too draconian although it’s true that tennis players seem to be able to get through matches without constant trips to the bathrooms and baseball players can only go at the end of an inning.
There is no reason to leave the playing hall at all during a game in progress.
Chessplayers who are addicted to smoking simply have to wait until AFTER the game is over and then have their smoke.
It’s ridiculous that in chess they make doping-tests in order to gain the status as a “sport” but on the other hand you may have a smoke (or 10 or 20) during a game?!
No tennisplayer is smoking during a game …
…and why not having a “shagging-area” for those who don’t smoke but want some other distraction during the game?
I wrote that they could go to the toilet at any time they wish, it’s just that there should be limitation on how many times during the game can they do it. I think one visits per hour of play is sufficient.
I blame FIDE in all of this. What the hell were they thinking in having such a small number of referees among 160 people?
Ultimately, chess will suffer because of the incompetence of a few.
What’s Shak done except file a protest with the tournament committee, the way he should do? It’s the press that improperly made his charges public. He didn’t call a press conference and announce it to the world, or repeat it in a half dozen interviews, like Topalov did.
But when he does do those things, I agree that he should get a very firm slap on the wrist, just like Topalov did, to prove we mean business.
In my opinion, FIDE must address this issue promptly. FIDE must also have clear rules and they MUST enforce these rules.
but we should give an exemption to anyone who has ever been rated over 2800, or who comes from Bulgaria. Or just anyone who plays exciting chess and draws less than a certain percent of their games. Or heck, how about anybody who thinks he has a reasonable suspicion?
Problem seems to be people are seeing some outside sources for their own failings. What was that about the fault not being in the stars but ourselves?
Topalov brought a parapsychologist to his match with Kramnik (that suggested right away he was looking at outside forces or had a belief in wacky stuff). Almost as if: I can’t be losing so it must mean that you’re cheating.
Other have had problems – conspiracies, holes in chairs, yoghurt, bigger and bigger sunglasses, harikrisna in audience, sci-fi ideas…
if it’s all dfone to pysch the opponent that’s one thing…the problem is when you begin to believe in it yourself.
Mamedyarov (according to GM Polgar) probably resigned early…what’s in the position to say there’s anything untoward? Shouldn’t a top GM hit lots of the moves a computer would get? Who wrote the program but humans? Didn’t Kramnik, Kasparov, etc go up against computer programs?
Because your opponent doesn’t behave like you but fidgets, walks about, goes out to smoke, you believe your bad play is down to his (supposed) cheating? This may all be the non-Western, cultural, less polite upbringing of the GMs – Fischer aside! The crushed ego (he’s lower rated, how can this be – as in any league/weekend congress), the minisculer prize monies coimpared to real sports that these ppl train so long to derive. All that effort and half a point on the board rather than one point…the cat’s out the bag…the easy allegation snowballed after Elista…now, no proof is needed, just “I’m higher rated, he shouldn’t be able to rebuff my novelty, I giove up, cheat, cheat…”…the Western way of innocent till proven otherwise is out…but FIDE and the top players come from a blunter world where rule of law, libel, etc are probably alien terms – so too democracy…though last few years, we haven’t lead by example in some parts anyhow…
With things like this, who’s going to invest serious monies in chess…play till high school, develop the little greys cells, but don’t get too hung up on it – take up poker, or boules…
Not everyone reacts to stress the same way. I used to get up after every move and due to the large quantities of water and nerves, went to the bathroom after almost every move. This was all long before computers, so I was never accused of cheating.
Just because you don’t need to do this don’t regulate those who are different from you. If you actually catch someone cheating, ban them for life.
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Problem seems to be people are seeing some outside sources for their own failings. What was that about the fault not being in the stars but ourselves?
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It’s from Shakespeare and has nothing to do with chess. If you’re saying that nobody ever cheats, then you’re very wrong indeed. The question at hand is how to deal with such accusations when we don’t know if they’re true or not. Arbitrarily deciding that no charges are true and that all defeats are legitimate, as you seem to be suggesting, is a silly solution.
What am I missing. Shak does not say in his letter of protest that this opponent cheated. He simply is pulling out of the tournament. Shak did not ask that his opponent be thrown out of the tournament. He did not ask that he be awarded a point. He only asked that things run smoother next time. It is very distracting if an opponent is leaving for long periods and more distracting if he leaves after every move. The mind then becomes suspicious and is not thinking about the chess moves.
No one here must be accused of anything. Simply FIDE must get rules in place before a tournament starts. The rules must be Professional.
I find it very upsetting when people are gathered during the games discussing in a foreign language. The usual mix of low class players with their GM coaches between moves.
I know it’s the Bard.
The line from Julius Caesar suggests we not blame others for our own shortcomings. It seems apt here. He had everything to do with everything.
The common thread is that of the accusations – against Kramnik and now against this GM, no accusations have been prove. In the West, one form could be slander and another libel.
No problem with banning if it’s proven but to just get up and shout “fire” is odd in the extreme.
If Federer starts losing to Nadal, can he just say anything – without proof? How does that affect the sport?
If FIDE wants to/has instituted metal detectors/seraches/banning from areas/playing underr glass domes, even limited toilet breaks/or having potties on stage/ or fuming cupboards into which GMs can smoke in full view/or any scheme, so be it. But if nothing’s been proven, what sport can survive, players (high profile ones at that) just suddenly upping any casting aspersions like that? When athlets have been caught, WADA/tests, etc, they’re banned. But don’t expect a swimmer to stop midstream because another swimmer whose PBs weren’t as good – suddendly got good.
It does nothing for chess.
If there’s cheating ok ban.
But it looks so far just like sore losers having a go.
So it was in the case with the Latvian GMs who lost last year…don’t blame outside forces WITHOUT proof.
Hopefully, chess can progress…hopefully.
No one suggests that all defeats are legitimate..that’d indeed be a “silly”
But it can’t just be left like this.
If FIDE sets has a setup, if ACP suggests anything – have a scenario at the venue. Anything outside this scenario is a no-no.
Anything inside this, is ok.
Extrapolate…the way things are going, perhaps prize monies are going to be squeezed in the present climate, ppl are more anxious…will there be more accusations/pull outs when ppl feel aggreived?
Look at other sports. Do they run it like this?
Anyhow, all the best. Ta-Ta and good morning.
Ermmm… going to toilet after every move? This is Kramnik, right?
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No one suggests that all defeats are legitimate..that’d indeed be a “silly”
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He didn’t say it in so many words, but that seemed the only way to interpret what he said. Certainly people should look to their own selves and play in most cases, but that doesn’t help in the other cases.
If we agree that those other cases may exist, the question is how to behave when they do? As I understand it, Shak didn’t make any public accusation, he complained privately to the tournament committee. That was good. Dropping out of the tournament prior to any investigation, and without giving them any opportunity to act, was a bit more hot-headed. And the big question is who told the press his reasons for withdrawing? Asking the press to behave responsibly and not publish unfounded accusations is pointless, so such accusations must be kept away from them.
Of course a person can withdraw from any tournament at any time, even for a bad reason. And he doesn’t have to tell the press why he did it. If he tells anyone why, and they repeat it to the press, the story gets out just the same.
So, what rule could we pass to prevent this? A rule prohibiting a player from dropping out the same round he files such a protest? But what happens if something legitimate comes up forcing him to?
Shak does seem to have exercised some bad judgment here. Not as bad as the judgment Topalov exercised, but even without airing his suspicions publicly, he reacted in such a way as to guarantee that the story would get out. Personally, I think he should have either protested and stayed in the tournament, or withdrawn without protesting. But I’m not sure how to make a rule requiring that.
“I find it very upsetting when people are gathered during the games discussing in a foreign language.”
Hmmm. All languages are foreign to somebody. And not foreign to somebody else.
I posted this also as a reply to a response here in Mig’s blog, first agreeing completely with the respondent that the stats are not significant toward any question of guilt.
However, I do believe they explain why the accusation arose. Humanly and practically—since I do not find any evidence of cheating ever by anyone rated over 2300 before suspicion—the issue at top levels is more preventing misunderstandings and ill-founded accusations. I’ve added 2 more engine runs to my posted file, and both again give 9 of 10 matches—not significant for stats but significant for affected humans, quite evidently!
Chess may need stricter regulation and understanding of allowed player behaviour, as this item’s title calls for. But what I see needed more prominently is understanding the math facts involved when you test an engine and write a letter mentioning this.
The main principle—I’ve had this bolded at the top of my site since Elista 2006 but just-now broke it into two shorter sentences—is that a move that is given a clear standout evaluation by a program is much more likely to be found by a strong human player. And a match to any engine on such a move is much less statistically significant than one on a move given slight but sure preference over many close alternatives. This is exemplified in my updated results file, with raw data viewable here.
I should clarify: Susan is only talking about strict rules on cheating allegations.
When I wrote first at Mig’s I was influenced by several comments, such as this one, on player comportment.
I’m completely in agreement with Susan above. Most in particular, people who write about having done engine-match tests need to provide log files of their tests. One can manually “Clip Analysis” with many interfaces, and in the freely downloadable Arena 2.01, one can automatically script runs to files. Indeed all the runs I’ve done and posted since last night have been scripted—this removes most human subjectivity on when to call something a “match”.
Providing logs allows someone else to test, judge, and reproduce one’s claims, and is a basic rule of science. Give the logs or don’t mention your tests—that should be written into the rules. Practically speaking, the extra discipline of assembling the log may be enough to clear one’s head before writing a reputationally committal letter…
Last two posters are real bores.
As I mentioned before, only one rule will prevent this thing in the future – the rule that says that players have to be at the table during the whole game.
Is that really so unheard of like some commentators say? I mean football players have to be out on the pitch for 90 minutes, no matter if it’s raining or snowing and no matter how cold or hot it is.
Chess players think that they are some sort of royalties. Thats why they think they don’t have to come punctually to the start of the game, can take as many breaks as they want to, can terminate the game whenever they feel like, don’t have to take doping controls, don’t have to talk to the media, etc.
They of course want to be paid like others professionals, but they don’t want to behave professionaly.
If they want chess to be an amateur sport then thats fine, let it be. But then they have to understand that they will play only for peanuts.
Chess players are just a bunch of spoiled brats! And for their amount of profssionalism they are over-payed.