2026 Chess Olympiad - Day 5

 (Apologies for the missed reports - FIDE Congress has started)

 After the outstanding effort in round 4, round 5 saw a tough pairing for the Women's team. Against a more experienced Jersey team they lost 3-1, but still scored a fantastic win board 3, with Natasha Mimino playing a great attacking game to beat her opponent in 19 moves.

The Open team lost to Mali 3-1, but unlike some rounds where we were unlucky, we were definitely lucky in our win. Ishmael Amnol was totally lost in a rook and pawn eneding, but his opponent misplayed it badly, resulting in a drawn position. After rejecting Ishmael's draw offer, he then blundered a 2nd time, allowing Ishmael to find a nice trick to reach a Q (for Ishmael) v R ending. But realizing he had blundered, the opponent offered his hand, and when Ishmael shook it (assuming it was a resignation), the opponent then said "Draw". However Ismael was having none of this, explained to the arbiter what had happened, and the game continued for the 5 or so moves until the Mali player finally made his last blunder. 

As for the other Oceania federations (sans Australia and NZ) , Guam is once again leading the way. The have 2 wins from 5 matches, putting them ahead of the other 9 (small) federations. In the Women's events, Guam and Fiji share the lead, both scoring 1 match win and 1 match draw.

 

 

2026 Chess Olympiad - Day 4

 An historic day for PNG Women's Chess with the Women's team beating Grenada 4-0. Having started with three 4-0 defeats, not only was this the first Olympiad win for the team, it was also the first Olympiad wins for the players as well. Natasha Mimino recorded the first win for the team, but this was soon followed by Luciana Age, Liberty Joku and Tiania Kukula all adding points for the team.

In the Open section the PNG team lost 1.5 - 2.5 to Saudi Arabia. The result could have been significantly different as Bing Barredo missed a forced win and got mated shortly after. Ishmael Amnol once again demonstrated his growing talent by picking up his 2nd win of the event to go to 2/4, while Tom McCoy scored half a point in a game where both sides seemed to sense that draw was the inevitable outcome, despite missed wins for both sides!

But the real controversy of the day was the default loss by GM David Smerdon  in his game against Albania, after he was found to have left his watch on during the game. The watch itself was not a communication device, but the tournament rule still requires a player wearing any kind of watch to be DQ'd.  Fortunately the rest of the team covered for this unfortunate outcome by scoring 2.5/3 to win the match.

2026 Chess Olympiad - Day 3

 A tough day for the PNG teams, with 0-4 results in both sections. The Open team has Trinidad and Tobago , who had consistently beaten us in previous events ( 3 since 2000 by my counting). Again lack of match experience was the main factor with good positions on 2 of the 4 boards disappearing with 1 move blunders. One thing that differentiates chess at this level from regular club or online chess is that wins have to be earned, not received.

The Women's team is showing continual improvement as they adjust to the style of this tournament. But again the difference between winning and won is match experience. On 2 boards PNG was winning or at least holding, but nerves can lead to the wrong choice and while 1.5-2.5 might have been the 'fairer' result, it was not to be. 

But the players recognise that the wins aren't that far off, and hopefully they  will start to come tomorrow.

2026 Chess Olympiad - Day 2

 I'll start with another complaint. The PNG Team (plus many others) are staying about an hour away from the venue. There is a morning shuttle bus service that starts at 10am, and I thought I would catch that in to see the final round of the FIDE People with Disabilities Olympiad. But there was no 10am bus, or 10:30 am bus, as apparently, the drivers were off having breakfast. So I missed that

On the other hand, the PNG Open team won their 2nd round match 2.5-1.5, against Palau. Not only was this a good win over our Oceania rivals, it was the earliest match win for a PNG team in the Olympiad (there was a 4-0 win on forfeit in Rd 2 at Baku, but that hardly counts).

 Stuart Fancy won a very quick game on Board 1, and Ishmael Amnol won his first Olympiad game on Board 3. And back and forth draw on Board 4 by Kavaea Evara sealed the match win for PNG. The Women's team had their chances against Togo, but went down 4-0. However they are in good spirits and tomorrow they should start to put some points on the board.

One of the regions larger islands (Australia) seems to be doing well in both sections, winning 2.5-1.5 against Cyprus in the Open, and 3.5-0.5 against South Korea in the Women's section.

 

Fancy, Stuart - Pedro, Aron
2026 Olympiad Round 2, PNG v Palau, 17.09.2026

2026 Chess Olympiad Day 1

 I am in Samarkand at the 2026 Chess Olympiad, so I figured I should post some updates as I go. 

As you might be aware from the headlines in the chess media there were/are issues with transport and accommodation. I can confirm by and large these reports are accurate.  The organisers seemed to be overwhelmed by the arrival of chess players (in Tashkent and Samarkand), although one would have thought they new we were coming. As a result the Tashkent Railway station was awash with players who had been told they had bookings, but found they did not have tickets. This issue was eventually resolved by handing out tickets to teams that made the most noise. Unfortunately the main PNG team had to wait 5 hours for a train, which deposited them in Samarkand at 4am. 

 Another hour by bus to the hotel complex, followed by confusion about which hotel we were staying at (they changed our hotel without telling us), and the team did not get to sleep until 6am (a full 12 hours after they arrived in Tashkent)

On the other hand, the chess venue is excellent. The playing hall is spacious, and the organisers have made it as comfortable as possible. As I am just Head of Delegation for Papua New Guinea this time, I did not have access to the playing area, so had to slum it in the very luxurious Expo area. Lots of activities, food and drink options, I was still bale to follow all of the action from a more comfortable viewing area. 

As for the chess, Round 1 is normally straightforward, with a few upsets thrown in. The PNG Open team almost pulled of a big one, going very close to 2-2 with Sri Lanka. We did pick up a default win on Board 4 (no idea why the Sri Lankan player was missing), and Tom McCoy had a winning position against his higher rated opponent on board 3. But a miscalculation late in the game turned a win into a loss, and we went down 1-3. For the first time ever PNG fielded a Women's team and despite losing 0-4 to Jordan, the team fought hard. Playing your first Olympiad and first Olympiad game is tough, and I am sure the next few rounds will see some improved results.

I think the Australian Open team won 4-0 against Senegal (based on the live broadcast results), while the Women's team won 3-1 (again based on live broadcast).  One upset result reported to me was a 2-2 between Brazil and Botswana, while top seeds India dropped a point to Thailand (on Bd 1) while Iraq took half a point off the USA

Have I invented a new game?

 I know this blog has been somewhat moribund recently, and I'd like to say I'm taking steps to fix this (Narrator: No such steps are being taken). But every now and then I do think of something to post

 I was toying with the idea of a dice game, and came up with an easy but possibly tricky version. It can teach kids about probability and decision make, but at the risk of turning them into degenerate gamblers.

 Two player game. Each player has one dice which they roll. At the start of the game they put $1 into the pot. The player with the higher number wins , but ... The loser can pay another $1 for a second roll. If they beat the winners first roll, they win the pot (ie $3) but if they tie or are still lower on the 2nd roll, they lose ($3). If the initial roll is tied, then the players add another $1 to the pot each (bringing the pot to $4 for the next roll). If they player declines the 2nd roll, they automatically lose.

Simple rules I hope, and something that can be easily played (if you have lots of $1 coins).

Where the trickiness lies is in when you should 'buy' the 2nd roll if you lose. If you lose to a 6, then buying a 2nd roll is a waste of time (as ties still lose the 2nd time around). But if you lose to a 2 (because you rolled a 1) then you probably should buy, as you have a 2/3 chance of winning. But the middle numbers become a little bit harder to judge. And secondly, is your decision affected by the size of the pot (eg you've tied 2 rolls in a row, so the pot is now $6 rather than $2).

I fed all this into an AI, just to check the math. It described this as an example of 'option pricing' (ie what should I pay for an expected return) but did not find any examples of this game existing elsewhere (noting it is AI and therefore is probably wrong)  

There are also possible variants - One is a gamblers ruin  version, where after each tie the pot is doubled (rather than increased by $2). Another is a turn limited game, where you play a fixed number of rounds (say 6 to 10). Does your decision change the closer you get to the finish of the game?

One big swindle

 At some point in my life I will probably play every mainline chess opening, either by design or accident (e.g. I once played a French Defence as black through a move order trick). The Benoni Defence looks to be the next cab of the rank, and I have been looking at a number of top level games. It is less popular at the top level these days, but serves as a succesful weapon at the lower levels. This may be due to the fact that Black requires tactical resources to overcome the openings positional defects, or as John Nunn says , the Benoni is "one big swindle"

 

Spassky,Boris Vasilievich - Fischer,Robert James (2785) [A77]
World-ch27 Fischer-Spassky +7-3=11 Reykjavik (3), 16.07.1972