One of the bloggers asked this very interesting question earlier. The question is:
“What are the most perfect criterion, in your opinion, for selecting a Men’s Olympic Chess Team / Women’s Olympiad Team?”
Every country has its own standard. The absolute worst possible thing is to have chess politicians create illogical policies which hinder the success of national teams. Unfortunately, this has long been the case with some countries.
In my opinion, one of the most logical criteria for a 5 person team (4 players + 1 alternate) is:
1. Top 3 rated players (based on a fair formula which include the latest rating at the time of selection plus perhaps the average rating of the preceding 12 months).
2. Winner of the an official Olympiad qualifying event which could be the national championship.
3. One pick by the captain / head coach.
There are other good methods as well. This is just one of them. What is your take?
That sounds like a sound formula….but look at these backwoods federations…politics et all…it’s rather embarrasing to watch em exclude their best players due to politics. And does anyone seriously think Vishy and Humpy are not playing because they just don’t feel like it? haha…the Indian federation is as absurd as the rest of em. And what about Azer…ah never mind…you get the point…the Chess world is being run by children.
I like your suggestion.
Just as soon as you find a way to get politics out of chess, then tell the sports world how it is done.
Pick ugliest players.
Why? I want to play for my country!
Danmark arrived and started their 1st training session :
http://www.jan-gustafsson.de/typo3temp/pics/0ff2a81c75.jpg
I will vote for Denmark to get medal in Russia.
its sad Politics plays a role in picking players for such an important team.
The simplest way, is to invite all players that are keen and available to play. Then the highest rated available players get choosen for the team.
This way playing strength counts, not politics.
This is the the way our Federation ran there team selection.
Sadly although this seemed a simple and fair way to do things, the selection progress was still effected by players putting there name forward for the team, and once selected they would withdraw from the team. This of course lead to a bit of a mess, and the result was the strongest available players were not all selected.
The criteria offered as a possible one are not consistently with the Olympics event.
Chess Olympics is a team sport.
Why should an individual performance (championship or qualifier), given under ‘1’ (mostly) and under ‘2’ (always) be merited for a direct qualification to a team event?
It sounds more better to take into account team events only.
I do not care for having a selection by the captain/head coach. The captain will already be making more than enough decisions by determing the lineup at each round.
I do not care for your idiotic comment. A captain / coach know the players the most. He / she would know who he / she can count on in crucial situations. What line up are you talking about? There are 5 players and 4 of them play in every round. The difference in rating between Hess and Onischuk/Kamsky/Nakamura is huge. Does it really take a genius to put a line up daily? Gimme a break.
Selection should go to those who pay the largest bribes to the selection committee.
If it’s good enough for the General Assembly, it’s good enough for the players.
Dunno, but UM suggest kamsky on board 1 , then naka, onischuck hess and shulman, but maybe they can win gold like this we will see!!! Susan, vishy not playin for india what happened? the fun just starting!
Hi.
I’m from Portugal … and at the portuguese Chess Federation home page … I Can not find the final information about our 2 Teams!
Maybe that’s an confidencial information!
How can FIDE force our federation to have some quality and respect for their players?
Susan, You’re the best!
Kisses,
Henry
International FIDE Instructor