You be the Arbiter (Part 1)

Prior to the meeting of the Rules and Tournament Regulations Committe, GM Bartlomiej Macieja posted a number of questions concerning the current rules of chess, and requested an interpretation from the Committee. While his questions were answered by RTRC, I am posting some of the questions here (with his permission), and am interested in what other people think.

According to point 9.1.a.:
"The rules of a competition may specify that players cannot agree to a draw, whether in less than a specified number of moves or at all, without the consent of the arbiter."

PART 1

I have played several tournaments with requirement of 30 moves. However, a few times players agreed to a draw before move 30 (I am not talking about repetitions), stopped a clock and signed a scoresheet.
The question is how an arbiter shall react?

I have seen various reactions. The most common are:
a) arbiters running after the players and forcing them to come back to the table and to continue playing,
b) arbiters giving 0 points to both players.

The first method for sure doesn't work (thus cannot be recommended) in huge events, where supervision is inadequate (too many participants, too few arbiters). It raises, however, an additional question - shall the proper reaction of an arbiter and a possible punishment for a player depend on the type of a tournament?

Now a real situation. On Sunday, the last round of the Polish Team Championship finished. A player with black had a chance for GM-norm - what he needed was only a draw. A player with white tried to win, but failed and eventually offered a draw in a slightly worse position. Black was very happy and accepted that offer. Unfortunately, it was still before the required move 30. Some minutes later an arbiter took both scoresheets and realised that a draw had been agreed before move 30. He decided to score that game as 0-0. One of the consequences is that Black has failed to make a GM-norm.
Was the reaction of the arbiter and sanctions against both players proper?

I believe RTR should present an opinion on this issue. Perhaps not on a particular case described by me, but as a general guideline. A 30-move rule is relatively new and it is unclear for many arbiters how to properly react.
By the way - what kind of procedure will be used in similar cases during the nearest Olympiad?

PART 2

Actually, the case described by me was more complicated. The players started protesting, stating that in previous rounds there were cases of a draw agreement before move 30. The arbiter found such games, indeed, and ... changed their results to 0-0. It raised additional controverses, because results of previously finished rounds had been changed only during the last round.
Obviously, an arbiter made a mistake earlier, but having realised that only during the last round what should have he done? To leave 1/2-1/2 or to change it to 0-0?

PART 3

There is one more controversy. After the change of the result to 0-0 the final result of a tied match became 2.5-2.5 (a match was played on 6 boards). How many points should have both teams been awarded? 1 (because it was still a draw) or 0 (because both teams scored less than 50%)? The arbiter decided to leave the match score unchanged, thus both teams remained 1 point.

Best regards
Bartlomiej Macieja

Is this a valid claim?

The 2009 Victorian Championship Reserves tournament has just started and already there has been one incident of note. In the game between David Beaumont and and Nikola Ivanov the position had just been repeated for a third time, and Ivanov, who was on the move, simply stated "It's draw". Then various spectators, who had been watching the game, began to analyse the position, with Ivanov, thereby destroying the actual game position. Part of the analysis included at least one move that was losing for Ivanov. All the while Beaumont had said nothing, and as the arbiter wasn't present, was of the opinion that the game hadn't been completed.
By the time the arbiter had reached the board, the analysis was in full swing, and even the chess clock had been removed by one of the tournament organisers, on the assumption that the game was over.
Having heard both sides of the story the tournament arbiter, IA Gary Bekker, ruled that as the position had been reached for a third time on the board, that the result was a draw. Beaumont entered a protest with the appeals committee that Ivanov had not claimed a draw correctly, in the sense that "It's Draw" wasn't a valid claim. He also asked that the game be continued with Ivanov having to play the losing move that appeared on the board during the analysis period.
The appeals committee upheld the first part of the protest (ie Ivanov didn't claim the draw correctly) but rejected the second part. They ordered the game to be continued from the position on the board, if the players themselves did not agree to a draw in the meantime.

Now I'm not privy to the reasoning of the appeals committee (although I have discussed this matter with Gary Bekker), but I don't agree with their decision. Once a player uses the word "draw", out loud, during a game, I (a) would regard that as a draw offer or (b) a draw claim, wherever appropriate. In part this is to prevent players from retracting draw offers (by claiming they didn't mean to say what they said) but also to discourage players from indulging in gamesmanship by musing aloud about the drawish nature of the position, in the hope their opponent will drop their guard.
The other objection I have to this decision is a purely practical one, in that once the game resumes, Ivanov, who is still on the move, can simply claim a draw anyway.
To me, in the above case, it was clear that Ivanov was aware that the position had occurred 3 times, and by saying "It's Draw" was claiming this.
Of course there are a couple of other related issues here as well, including the behaviour of the spectators, but the other lesson here is that players should always sign scoresheets at the conclusion of the game, so as to agree on a result.

Further discussion on the matter can be found at Chesschat and Ozchess bulletin boards

Event: Victorian Ch Reserves
Site: Melbourne
Date: 2009.10.10
Round: 1
White: Ivanov, Nikola
Black: Beaumont, David
Result: 1/2-1/2
ECO: B30

1. e4 c5 2. Nc3 Nc6 3. Nf3 Nf6 4. d3 d5 5. Be2 d4 6. Nb1 e5 7. Nbd2 Be7 8. O-O O-O 9. Nc4 Qc7 10. Bg5 Ne8 11. Qc1 f6 12. Bh4 Be6 13. Nfd2 g5 14. Bg3 b5 15. Na3 Rb8 16. b3 a6 17. Nf3 h6 18. Nb1 Rd8 19. Nbd2 Nd6 20. h3 Rf7 21. Nh2 Rh7 22. Bh5 c4 23. Ndf3 Nb7 24. Ng4 Nc5 25. Rd1 Kg7 26. Rb1 Bf7 27. Bxf7 Kxf7 28. h4 h5 29. Ngh2 g4 30. Ne1 Nb4 31. Ra1 cxd3 32. cxd3 Rc8 33. Qd2 a5 34. Rdc1 Bf8 35. Qe2 Bh6 36. Rcb1 Ne6 37. a3 Nc2 38. Ra2 Nxe1 39. Qxe1 Qc3 40. Qd1 Rg7 41. Nf1 Kg6 42. Kh2 Bf4 43. f3 Kh6 44. Kh1 gxf3 45. Qxf3 Rcg8 46. Be1 Qc5 47. g3 Be3 48. Bxa5 Rg6 49. Bb4 Qb6 50. Bd2 Bxd2 51. Rxd2 Nc5 52. Qd1 Qe6 53. Kh2 Rg4 54. Rc2 Nxb3 55. Rc7 Nc5 56. Qc1+ Kg6 57. Rxc5 Rxg3 58. Nxg3 Qg4 59. Nf5 Qe2+ 60. Kh1 Qf3+ 61. Kh2 Qe2+ 62. Kh3 Qg4+ 63. Kh2 Qe2+ 1/2-1/2

Using Precedent

(Disclaimer: As I have had no legal training parts of this post may be completely wrong from a legal perspective. If so feel free to correct me)

Having got involved with the FIDE Rules and Tournament Regulation Committee, one thing I've noticed is the difference between how players see the rules, and how arbiters see the rules. But let me explain.
Most criticism of the rules from players concern rules that are published. For example, the rule concerning forfeit time or the rules concerning insufficient material to mate (cf KN vKN controversies) attracted a lot of criticism from players. On the other hand, when the RTRC was meeting in Dresden, most of the concern from arbiters was about rules that were not written. Their big worry was that without a published rule they wouldn't know how to make a correct ruling.
Part of the latter problem is caused by the lack of published case law, or the acceptance of it. If we think of the FIDE Rules of Chess as statute law, to mimic a full blown legal system, there needs to be a repository of published case law. By that I mean somewhere where arbiters can look up decisions previously made by other senior or experienced arbiters, and use this decisions as a precedent to support their own decision making. And just as in a proper legal system, such decisions may be reviewed by a higher body (appeals panel or FIDE itself), resulting in a definitive ruling for that set of circumstances.

Here is an example of what I mean.

In the Radjabov v Smeets game at Corus this year (2009) there was an incident jut before the first time control. On his 39th move Radjabov moved a rook but in doing so knocked over Smeets' bishop. Radjabov then pressed his clock without returning the bishop to the correct square. Smeets immediately restarts Radjabov's clock, and asks him to replace the bishop. Radjabov presses his own clock, but by this stage has lost on time.

At the time the arbiters took a pragmatic approach of letting the players agree to a draw (as Radjabov claimed that Smeets acted illegally in speaking to him during the game), but that doesn't address the 'legal' position.
Geurt Gijssen was asked about it in his April 2009 Arbiters Notebook column. In his opinion he felt that Smeets had acted correctly under Article 7.3 of the rules of chess, and that Radjabov should have lost on time.

Given Gijssen's position as chair of RTRC, I would suggest that this opinion is now established precedent for situations of this kind, and therefore as an arbiter I would allow a player to act in the same way as Smeets (restarting the opponents clock), without sanction. And I would do so until either (a) the FIDE Laws of Chess are altered to deal with this situation in a different way or (b) a higher authority (the full RTRC, FIDE Presidential Board or FIDE General Assembly) offer an alternative ruling.

Ignoring Touch move = Illegal Move?

From GM Bartlomiej Macieja to the FIDE Rules and Tournament Regulations Committee, and republished here with his permission

Dear Members of the Rules and Tournament Regulations Committee

I would like to consult with you the following cases:

1)
In a blitz game a player deliberately touches a piece, but eventually moves another piece.
An opponent claims a win basing on Article B.3.c:
"An illegal move is completed once the opponent's clock has been started. The opponent is entitled to claim a win before he has made his own move."
What should an arbiter decide?

2)
In a rapid game, in the phase when both players have only seconds left to the end of a game, a player deliberately touches a piece, but eventually moves another piece.
An opponent calls an arbiter, claiming that irregularity.
What should an arbiter decide?

What should an arbiter decide in cases 1) and 2) if a player wishing to claim the above mention irregularity, having only 1 second left, doesn't manage to stop the clock before his flag fells?

Best regards
Bartlomiej Macieja

Feel free to make your answers in the comments section to this post.