New Delhi: India and Russia were announced joint winners of the 2020 Online FIDE Chess Olympiad after the final was marred by internet disconnection last night.
After a 3-3 tie in the first round, where all six games ended in a draw, the second and decisive match was impacted by a global internet outage, that severely affected many countries including India.
Two of the Indian players, Nihal Sarin and Divya Deshmukh, lost connection towards the end of the game, subsequently losing on time. The incident happened when three games ended in draws and the outcome of the match was still unclear.
As a result, Russia was initially proclaimed the winner of the match, after being adjudicated a victory by 4½-1½ in the second round. However, India appealed the result on the grounds that their players (along with hundreds of other users) were logged out of Chess.com as a consequence of a massive internet outage at the time of the games.
As soon as the last game between Goryachkina and Koneru was over (Gorychkina won in a long battle in a rook endgame), India appealed the match result on the grounds that their players (along with hundreds of other users) were logged out of Chess.com as a consequence of a massive internet outage at the time of the games.
India had appealed against the controversial decision.
However, the international chess federation Fide’s president Arkady Dvorkovich decided to award the gold medal to both the teams.
This was the first time Fide was holding the Olympiad in an online format. India had reached the finals of the FIDE Chess Olympiad for the first time
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