Falling Asleep Over the Board

This story in the Times newspaper reports that Vladislav Tkachiev, a professional chess player fell asleep over the chessboard while facing an opponent at a tournament. As the story goes ahead to explain, it is being posited that the maverick player, who is ranked 58 worldwide, was probably inebriated. I think that chess players are also entitled to having fun.

What I find most surprising is the call by Nigel Short and the tone of other officials in seeking to punish the player further. This is all unnecessary and the action of desperate official in professional sports in thinking that more rules will lead to their version of better behaviour. My view is that the response here is extremely silly. To start with, I play chess occasionally against friends and while I am nowhere near master level, I understand more than these officials are betraying.

They seem to be unaware that to be a chess Grandmaster requires such discipline and a high degree of concentration that it is in the interest of any player who relies upon it for income to be alert throughout matches. So to introduce any rules of overreact in this instance is just show for the crowds and the sponsors but this indignation is completely unjustified. I also think that due to the required level of alertness and the generally high intelligence of competitive chess players, the single event of a player falling asleep on the board is some remote and unlikely. The appropriate response is to let it pass and not make rules for an event that is so unlikely to occur again. True, Mr. Tkachiev should forfeit the match and the prize money and that is all. Chess is played at that level by extremely intelligent, if eccentric people, who do not need to be governed by more rules. And while at it, may i ask who benefits from rules?