This Is A Grandmaster?

Chess grandmaster, Gaioz Nigalidze, was caught cheating in an international tournament and immediately thrown out of the competition. The Georgian was expelled from the Dubai Open for using his smartphone in a match against Armenian grandmaster Tigran L Petrosian.

During the match, Nigalidze would reply to moves by his opponent and then run to the toilet. Petrosian grew suspicious when he noticed that Nigalidze always went to the same toilet partition even when two other partitions weren't occupied. Match officials went into the partition and found a hidden mobile phone in one of the cubicles. They then opened the smartphone and found it was logged into a social networking site under Nigalidze's account. They also found his game being analyzed in one of the many chess apps available.

Nigalidze faces a ban of up to 15 years and some in the chess community had publicly said that Nigalidze should be stripped of his grandmaster title. I too think he should be stripped of his grandmaster title.

Why? Simply because anyone stupid enough to think that they can get away with a cheating method as simple as this does not deserve to be a grandmaster of anything.

Seriously; going to the toilet to check answers? That’s something children in primary school do! A chess grandmaster can’t think of a better (smarter) way to cheat than to follow what a 12 year old would do? At least when Lance Armstrong cheated, he had an army of doctors and lawyers behind him. This guy went to the toilet? Worse, this guy didn’t even have the courtesy of linking the phone to an anonymous account!

Of course he should be banned immediately. Anyone this stupid should not be a grandmaster of anything, much less chess!