Opinion Sought

[Martin Benjamin]

At the World Senior Team Championships in April, I had a situation i had never encountered before, and i wonder what the opinions of qualified arbiters and others are. In one game, the chief arbiter announced the start of the round over the microphone and my game (I had Black) began 1 e4 e5 2 Nf3 Nc6 a3 Bb5 a6, at which point a "floating" arbiter said we had to stop playing and go back to the start as only two of our team of four were at the board and three of us had to be (two others in the team liked to arrive at the board a minute or two late to avoid the crowds). It seemed a bit officious and unnecessary to me, but apparentiy it is the rule, so I didn't question it. The arbiter reset the board to the starting position, and a few seconds later, our two missing team members arrived, so we were allowed to start again. However, my opponent did semi-seriously ask if we were obliged to play the same three moves from the starting position, or whether either of us could play something different. The arbiter avoided the question, so we just took the sensible, uncontroversial course, and played the same moves. But could one of us have deviated, if having seen a Ruy Lopez on board, we wanted something different? And (less importantly), could my opponent have insisted on resetting the clock times?

[Christopher Kreuzer]

I am not an arbiter, but I do get the logic of requiring a certain proportion of the team to be present before play starts. In theory, those arriving late could modify their opening preparation (and overall team strategy) based on what they see others have played on other boards. Though this can be done at the board at the cost of a few minutes time, so seems pointless.

On whether to play the same moves, ethically yes, legally, no obligation (IMO). I am not surprised the arbiter avoided the question. They probably realised saying anything would make the situation worse. The arbiter should have reset the clock times at the point the board was reset to the starting position.

I did play in an event once where the start times were strict. Arrive even a few seconds late and you lost the game. I think FIDE did this for a while and then dropped it (again, not unsurprisingly).

[Roger de Coverly]

6, at which point a "floating" arbiter said we had to stop playing and go back to the start as only two of our team of four were at the board and three of us had to be (two others in the team liked to arrive at the board a minute or two late to avoid the crowds). It seemed a bit officious and unnecessary to me, but apparentiy it is the rule, so I didn't question it.

Surely the arbiter is making up his or her own rules.

These are the specific tournament rules
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source= ... UNIVgYhWIc

And there's nothing about the whole team having to be present.

There might be some local Albanian rule for team competitions but that should not be relevant

[Ian Thompson]

a "floating" arbiter said we had to stop playing and go back to the start as only two of our team of four were at the board and three of us had to be (two others in the team liked to arrive at the board a minute or two late to avoid the crowds). It seemed a bit officious and unnecessary to me, but apparentiy it is the rule, so I didn't question it.

It is the rule, so the arbiter was right to stop the game. Surprisingly, there's nothing in the rules about starting clocks on time, e.g. what should happen on a board if all the White player's team are present, but only two of the Black player's team have arrived? Rules of this type usually say that a team that caused a late start to a match loses time on their clocks.

The arbiter reset the board to the starting position, and a few seconds later, our two missing team members arrived, so we were allowed to start again. However, my opponent did semi-seriously ask if we were obliged to play the same three moves from the starting position, or whether either of us could play something different. The arbiter avoided the question, so we just took the sensible, uncontroversial course, and played the same moves. But could one of us have deviated, if having seen a Ruy Lopez on board, we wanted something different? And (less importantly), could my opponent have insisted on resetting the clock times?

If the arbiter told you to restart the game, both players are free to make whatever moves they like in the new game. If the game was being restarted, the arbiter should have reset the clock to the correct starting times. Presumably, you both got three extra increments if he didn't do that, less whatever time had elapsed on the clock during the aborted game.

[LawrenceCooper]

6, at which point a "floating" arbiter said we had to stop playing and go back to the start as only two of our team of four were at the board and three of us had to be (two others in the team liked to arrive at the board a minute or two late to avoid the crowds). It seemed a bit officious and unnecessary to me, but apparentiy it is the rule, so I didn't question it.

Surely the arbiter is making up his or her own rules.

These are the specific tournament rules
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source= ... UNIVgYhWIc

And there's nothing about the whole team having to be present.

There might be some local Albanian rule for team competitions but that should not be relevant

Such a rule could prove problematic to my 4NCL teams given the players slightly relaxed approach to being there at the start

[Roger de Coverly]

Such a rule could prove problematic to my 4NCL teams given the players slightly relaxed approach to being there at the start

The linked document says the rule only applies to what FIDE calls L1 tournaments which are the "official" FIDE events. Senior team championships would count.

It says that it's recommended for other events but I'm not aware of British arbiters enforcing it in any way. An exception from time to time is where one or both teams have players delayed on the way to the match, for example in one of the Counties finals this year. In that event it would have been difficult to start the clocks as they were delayed as well.

League matches frequently have variable starting times based on the presence or otherwise of a majority of the players. Venues with strict closure times might be an exception.

As suggested it's ill defined as to what happens to clock times and whether it is correct to abort a game if it had been started with fewer than the specified players present.

It may be reasonable that in an Olympiad where teams may be delayed by the official transport or zealous security that the match arbiter has the power to delay the start. That at least is an improvement over the nonsense that applied for a couple of years that players not seated at the board at the exact start time could be defaulted.

[Kevin Thurlow]

It seems a particularly stupid rule. Surely, any team member wanting to see what other openings are being played (if that's the reason), just sits there? The first time I saw Boris Spassky playing live, photographers were swarming round the playing area, and he just sat there until they were ushered out, then made his first move.

[Martin Benjamin]

Thanks. I agree that if the letter of the law were strictly pursued, either player could deviate from the "previous" game (in which case we would need to complete fresh scoresheets with the multitude of details required at the top) and the clocks should be reset to something like 1:30 v 1:29 (if only one minute had elapsed). However, this seems to me like an unnecessary and potentially distracting law, arbiters have enough on their plate without having to get involved in things like this. If it happens unintentionally, as in this case, it might have been simplest and most convenient just to require me to let my clock run until a third team member turned up, without having to go back to the starting position, given we had already started the game, but I suppose the strict interpretation of the law would require a complete restart.

Just to add to the confusion, if I recall correctly, our other player present wasn't asked to stop his game, because while the floating arbiter stepped in and told us to reset the pieces on our board and we had just finished doing that, before she could tell our other player to do the same, both our remaining players had arrived!