08-31-2020, 12:12 AM
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-53965748 India and Russia have been declared joint winners of a major international chess tournament after two Indian players lost their internet connection during the final round.
An online version of the Chess Olympiad contest is being held for the first time this year because of coronavirus.
India appealed after two of its players lost connection to their games and forfeited on time.
Officials said these were "unprecedented circumstances".
"The Online Chess Olympiad has been impacted by a global internet outage, that severely affected several countries, including India. Two of the Indian players have been affected and lost connection, when the outcome of the match was still unclear," Arkady Dvorkovich, president of the International Chess Federation, said in a statement.
Well, I guess this isn't the way that either team would have liked the tournament to end - but, given the circumstances, it's probably the fairest thing to do. (Other than holding a rematch, but I assume there was some reason why they couldn't do that - otherwise, they would have done
)Let's just hope the next tournament isn't ruined by anything similar!