Views On The FIDE Circuit Points Dispute?

I see Arionian, Anish and a few others have been weighing in on the way points are awarded for the FIDE circuit.

Any views on this? Personally, I think the exact opposite of them - I think points should be more heavily weighted to Open tournaments with large fields, rather than closed shop events.

There are enough Candidates places awarded via the World Cup and Grand Swiss for the top players to make it. If you want to cash in on closed events and protect your rating (another potential entry point) then fair enough. But more than that is having your cake and eating it.

I think FIDE has the balance nearly right - I'd take a place away from the World Cup (proven to be a poor entry point this year) and give it to the circuit. I'd also make the circuit entry points counted over two years (not one person per year). And, as I said before, weight more highly towards Open events not the Arionian approach.

LoL. Too many Is flying about there...

@1

"points should be more heavily weighted to Open tournaments with large fields"
++ No. An open tournament requires unnecessary risks to win from weaker players instead of drawing. It becomes a gamble.

"There are enough Candidates places" ++ No. There are only 8 candidates.
Better players than Abasov (Abdusattorov, Erigaisi, So, Wei, Dominguez Perez, Giri...) failed to qualify. Better go up to 10 candidates and shorten the time control to 90|30.

"I think FIDE has the balance nearly right"
++ Abasov #123 should not have been there. Not his fault, but fault of the selection criteria.

"a place away from the World Cup (proven to be a poor entry point this year)" ++ Yes

"make the circuit entry points counted over two years"
++ No, that hinders youngsters like Gukesh.

"weight more highly towards Open events" ++ No, less.

@6

Game fixing is even more of an issue in an open tournament. An outsider may sell a loss.

Funny you said that - This year is probably the first time ever I haven't seen a minute of the snooker! A long time ago I used to watch quite a lot. More recently, I've made it almost a traditional to wait until the quarters / semis before starting. But this year, absolutely everyone I may have watched was knocked out before the semis, so I landed up seeing nothing!

You cut what I said to make another point. I said there were enough candidate via the World Cup and Grand Swiss. Not that there were enough spots per se.

Having said that, I disagree on that - I think eight is enough.

I'm not sure re the time format tbh. I thought it was funny that so many matches saw the players burn time and it almost turning into blitz. Maybe a larger increment from the off would help with that I guess...

@10

"I think eight is enough." ++ 10 would be better. Zürich 1953 even had 15. I would have preferred Abdusattorov, Erigaisi, So, Wei, Dominguez Perez, Giri... to participate instead of Abasov.

"so many matches saw the players burn time and it almost turning into blitz."
++ When two equals play, he who thinks longer can look deeper and is more likely to obtain a won position.

Definitely any of these guys would have been better than Abasov. Although as was saying adjusting the World Cup route would have fixed that.

Butt I don't know if any of these guys would really have challenged. I definitely felt sorry for So and Giri but let's be honest, neither of them would genuinely have been close to winning the Candidates, so I don't know if expanding would serve any real purpose.

Better it be a competition to put forward a candidate as a potential World Champion rather than just being another tournament.

good