Richardson/Spens results

[Keith Rose]

Alan - nope. It was a DGT with the big rocker.

[Keith Rose]

Alan - nope. It was a DGT with the big rocker.

[George Neave]

Alan - nope. It was a DGT with the big rocker.

Must have been sticky given how hard someone was bashing it

[Alan Tate]

Ok, DGT are normally pretty good. Sounds like plenty of drama anyway.

[amuir]

Congratulations to Edinburgh West. My childhood friend Walter Buchanan has a double celebration as he is getting married in early May. It is never too late for chessplayers to find love. I had three decades of bachelor chess playing before my marriage in 1999. After a front page picture on Scottish Chess, Jonathan and Keti are showing the way with a successful chess marriage of about 20 years.

[Graeme Kafka]

Congratulations to West. A well-fought match and deserving champions. See you next year (if I get a game!)

I must endorse Andy M's comments fully too. It is never too late (in life!) to find love with a chessplayer.

[Mike Truran]

Apologies if I'm labouring the point, but what's the point of a rule that requires a player to be defaulted even if his/her phone is in the arbiter's possession? Surely the intention of a rule should be to prevent a player having access to an electronic device? If handing the phone to an arbiter for safe keeping before start of play doesn't fulfil that requirement, then what is the point of the rule?

[andyburnett]

Jacob has gone into some detail about what happened here...

http://www.qualitychess.co.uk/blog/

[Alan Tate]

John Shaw's comment literally made me lol: "One addition to the story is that Jacob’s phone does not ring or beep. It plays “Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger” by Daft Punk."

[Andrew Greet]

Apologies if I'm labouring the point, but what's the point of a rule that requires a player to be defaulted even if his/her phone is in the arbiter's possession? Surely the intention of a rule should be to prevent a player having access to an electronic device? If handing the phone to an arbiter for safe keeping before start of play doesn't fulfil that requirement, then what is the point of the rule?

I'm not an arbiter, but I'm pretty sure it's because a ringing phone will distract everyone else in the room.

Funnily enough, John, Jacob and I were debating the appropriate punishment over dinner tonight at the 4NCL. I was the only one who agreed with the rule that a ringing phone should lead to disqualification. John said he doesn't find a ringing phone any more off-putting than, say, someone sneezing, whereas I find it intensely annoying, so that probably goes some way towards explaining our differing views.