Chess Tantrums.
The chess world has once again been gripped by a tale involving Magnus Carlsen and possible cheating by an opponent.
Magnus is no longer chess world champion. This is because of an earlier incident in which Carlson publicly accused his young opponent of cheating. After the game, Magnus pulled out of the next world championships, and has remained somewhat in the wilderness since.
Now competing again, he loses again to a fellow grandmaster, who plays a brilliant game, which was subsequently described as a masterpiece. In his post match interview, Magnus claims he had been distracted by the electronic watch being worn by his opponent. Very quickly, his remarks were taken to be another accusation of cheating. Despite his efforts to clarify, Carlsen was unable to damp down the fire he had started. To make matters worse, computer analysis showed his opponent had played at such a high level, that it was almost beyond his playing strength.
Magnus is acquiring a reputation as a bad loser. This is a shame for Chess’s superstar of his generation, and arguably of all time.
Writing in the discussion site Quora, a fellow grandmaster mused about the way Chess players resign. Sometimes gracefully sometimes badly he commented. An example of a gracious loser is Boris Spassky, many years ago, after losing a game to Bobby Fischer. Immediately afterwards, Bobby gave a public demonstration of the game that was so brilliant it caused Spassky to stand and give Fisher a well deserved ovation ...
