When Hans Niemann beat
Magnus Carlsen, the
world chess champion, in the Sinquefield Cup on September 4, he ended Carlsen’s
53-game unbeaten streak in classical over the board tournaments, and set into
motion a debacle that has turned into one of the biggest chess scandals in
years.
اضافة اعلان
The next day, Carlsen withdrew from the tournament,
which is an exceedingly rare move, especially among top players in elite
events. He also tweeted a cryptic video of José Mourinho, the Portuguese soccer
manager, saying, “I prefer really not to speak. If I speak, I am in big
trouble.” In the video, Mourinho is speaking at a news conference after a game
in which his team might have lost because of questionable officiating, so
online observers interpreted Carlsen’s post as insinuating that Niemann cheated
in some way during the game. A representative for Carlsen did not respond to
multiple requests for comment.
Tony Rich, the executive director of the Saint Louis
Chess Club, which hosts the Sinquefield Cup, said in a statement, “A player’s
decision to withdraw from a tournament is a personal decision, and we respect
Magnus’ choice.” The same day, David Sedgwick, an anti-cheating arbiter,
requested that the Saint Louis Chess Club add a 15-minute delay on the live
broadcast.
Though many people accused Niemann of cheating, few
of them offered any concrete evidence. Niemann did not respond to multiple
requests for comment. Hikaru Nakamura, an American grandmaster once ranked
second in the world, said on his Twitch stream: “There was a period of over six
months where Hans did not play any prize-money tournaments on
Chess.com. That
is the one thing that I’m going to say and that is the only thing I’m going to
say on this topic.”
Some observers took this to mean that Niemann had
cheated on the site, and by extension had cheated in the Sinquefield Cup. In
the days following the match, Chess.com said that it had “privately removed”
Niemann’s account from its website.
In a phone interview, Rich said that there was no
formal complaint or allegation of cheating made in writing. He also went on to
say that the club places a lot of weight on the integrity of events it hosts.
Among the 10 players participating in the
Sinquefield Cup, Niemann was the lowest rated and the least likely to upset the
world champion.
And yet he did.
In fact, he was the first chess player to beat
Carlsen with the black pieces in a classical over the board, or in person, game
in more than two years. Carlsen is a universal player, capable of playing
almost any opening or position. He is well known for his accuracy and
calculation, sober playing style, and solid opening choices, especially with
the white pieces.
There is no question that Niemann’s performance is a
statistical anomaly, not just in this one particular game but also over the
past year. As Niemann said in his postgame interview Tuesday, for the past two
years, he went from one tournament to the next, without pause, living out of a
suitcase. His Elo rating, a metric used to gauge the strength of chess players,
rose above 2700 after his win over Carlsen last week, from 2484 in January
2021. Statistical analysis by Pawnalyze, a chess analysis blog, showed that
Niemann had consistently outperformed his rating strength to an astonishing
degree.
Those who think that Niemann may be cheating can
also point to circumstantial evidence from his past. In a recent interview that
took place after Nakamura’s comments, Niemann acknowledged that he had violated
rules of fair play at least twice in the past by using computer assistance in
online games.
There were mitigating circumstances: He was young,
and a friend was running a chess engine, a piece of software that determines
the best move, and calling out those moves while Niemann played in a tournament
online. But such a violation of trust in a community that prizes integrity and
greatly discourages cheating makes a player’s reputation difficult to repair.
In addition to these past cheating incidents,
Niemann is notorious in the chess community for his abrasive personality.
On Saturday, September 10, six days after Niemann
beat Carlsen, Chris Bird, the chief arbiter of the Sinquefield Cup, released a
statement that there was no indication that any competitor was “playing
unfairly,” including in matches that had taken place before the 15-minute
broadcast delay was enacted.
Nonetheless,
Niemann’s meteoric rise raises important questions for professional chess. FIDE
and the organizers of large tournaments owe the community of players and fans
clear guidelines and procedures for how to handle what is likely to be an
increasingly common phenomenon.
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