• Submitted by: admin
• Havana
• national
• personalities
• Science and Technology
• Sports
• Personalities
• 01 / 12 / 2010

---

The controversy returns as usual in recent seasons, since the National Commission decided to protect the ELO of Grandmaster (GM) Leinier Dominguez and forbid his participation for the Cuban chess title.

Those who defend this practice to protect Leinier’s coefficient are right, won with great sacrifice and at great risk if subjected to a lid or a match against players who have mostly more than 100 ELO points less.

Winning a hypothetical match will not guarantee him to remain in the privileged group of those having 2 700 ELO points. He must practically crush his opponents. Not to mention a defeat, it will be very difficult to recover those points in competitions Leinier is generally involved with.

However, there is the other viewpoint: one defending the National Championship by all means. The one who wins the National Chess Championship cannot really enjoy it since the best player of the country did not attend.

In addition, it is more important to Leinier to say I was many times champion in Cuba than spending two years above the 2700 ELO points. Who cares? He already went down in history as the first men to pass the 2 600 and 2 700 ELO points in the country. The rest is in the background because you will always remember the titles.

Certainly, the current format is risky for him because he jeopardizes his high ratio, the one that allows him to be taken into account to attend tournaments of great relevance, but a new formula could be considered in this regard.

I venture to suggest that he can be seeded for a match with the winner of the National Chess Championship, which would serve more or less as a candidates match. But the risk is present even this way, unless the title can be defined in rapid games or blitz, non-cumulative for ELO ratings. Some argue that a national title should not be submitted through this form, far from the true chess, according to some experts.

The truth is that the ideal formula does not appear, and Leinier does not win a title at home, while others might win it and are not satisfied with his absence.

Source: Cubasí