Yes, thank you Ken. I phrased my sentence badly. The point I meant to make is, as you said, that FIDE doesn’t expect arbiters, and only arbiters, to call every flag fall. Most of the time the players make the claim, just as in USCF chess.
A proposed change to USCF rules would allow the same practice. TDs would be able to call flags if witnessed. This will need to address the “filling in the scoresheet after a flag fall” dilemma however. Increased use of the 30 second increment is my recommendation .
It depends on the [thrown out] spectator/player’s score vs. the scores of the two players involved in the game. It makes sense not to increase the number of aggrieved parties to more than the three aforementioned players.
I was once in a situation when I was in contention for the prizes with the two players involved in a game that was scored 1-1/2. I remember feeling very hard done-by.
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Perhaps the problem is caused partly by the choices made in engineering the clock rules. A better choice might have been to let the clock call flag falls when it can do so reliably.
In a time-control, any segment which specifies an infinite number of turns, the electronic digital clock should be expected to notify both players that a flag has fallen. The clock time remaining of 0:00 should gently flash, and a brief pair of audible beeps, would be appropriate. And the clock’s times should freeze.
Examples of infinite turns segments are:
The single segment in the time-control of – “Game/30 minutes + Delay 5 seconds”.
The second of the two segments in the time-control of – “40 moves/90 minutes; SuddenDeath/30 minutes; + Delay 5 seconds from turn 1”.
The clock does not have enough certainty about the number of turns to enable the clock to call flag fall in the first segment of example #2, a segment which has a less than infinite number of turns…
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Agreed that the clock should indicate a forfeit, and freeze, at the end of any G/nn or SD/nn control.
This clock behavior would be compatible with both FIDE and USCF rules. A FIDE arbiter could immediately declare the game over. A USCF director could do nothing, and wait for the non-expiring player to claim a win on time before getting checkmated or stalemated or reaching a dead position.
A milder approach, but along the same lines, would be appropriate for non-SD controls, such as the first control in a 40/60 SD/30 event (with or without increment or delay). Here, the clock should indicate a possible forfeit (e.g. by displaying a flag) on the side of the player who ran out of time first. The clock should behave in this manner regardless of whether it thinks 40 moves have been played or not. But, unlike SD, the clock should then continue running.
This clock behavior, too, would be compatible with both FIDE and USCF rules. A FIDE arbiter could declare the flag down as soon as it happens, if he is convinced (via scoresheets or other external evidence) that move 40 has not yet been reached. If the arbiter isn’t present to witness the flag down (shame on the arbiter, says FIDE), but arrives at the board shortly thereafter (whether by chance or by being summoned by one of the players), the arbiter could first determine (via scoresheets, etc) whether 40 moves have been played, and if not, declare the game lost by the player who flagged first (whose identity is known because of the clock behavior).
The USCF director in this situation could simply ignore the clock’s flag display, wait for a claim by one of the players, and then rule appropriately.
I would eject him with no refund regardless of age and make sure he and his parents were very clear on why he was ejected; I probably would not refer a young player to ethics.
If he is a playing spectator, he plays and gets ejected by the same rules as all the other players.
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