Why is there no backlash to Carlsen's accusation?

I posted this elsewhere but it’s relevant here too...

I dislike Magnus, but he was fine with today’s decision in my eyes for two reasons:

1. He had Black. It’s hard to win against the best of the best with Black. Sure, he could have played something sharper, but then the odds also increase greatly that he loses.

That’s the superficial reason. Now for the one that likely factors in more...

2. In Stavanger, like most non-Saint Louis events these days, the organizers don’t own the venue. They’re renting. Therefore the playoff will be today if there is one.

If the playoff were tomorrow then a player could press for 5-6 hours trying to win and be fine for the playoff tomorrow.

But since it’s the same day, spending 5-6 hours and drawing anyhow puts one at a massive disadvantage.

Hard to blame Magnus for that.

Wait, now I’m hearing playoff would be tomorrow. So Magnus’s decision makes no sense in that case.

Carlsen still gets a rest day. There's a difference between strategic draws and pre-arranged draws.

... and that Caruana guy just had to come and ruin it. Instead of allowing for an epic 5-way tiebreak, he decided to just take the trophy for himself. How selfish of him!

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Do you have a Lady Gaga quote to back that up?

Wait. @smyslovfan, people won after getting a winning position when they agreed to a draw beforehand??

Yup.

That's shameful! If you promised your opponent a draw then you should honor your promise. Imagine what chess would come to if players don't even have the dignity to honor agreements with their opponents!

I'm not sure what the backlash should be? I think the most repeated comment on the subject has been either that Carlsen himself pre-agrees draws (for example supposedly the one against MVL, when he drew with black in the last round), or that Carlsen is just like Fischer (i.e. accusing opponents of pre-agreeing draws).

On #1 (Carlsen pre-agrees draws), I think he is the top player that is least prone to draw his games. The last time he drew a classical game in 15 moves or less was in 2004 (against a considerably higher rated opponent). I don't think he is pre-agreeing draws, rather that the accusations that he does are based on people claiming that he was supposed to win easily with black against MVL and then were disappointed. But he hasn't beaten MVL with black in 13 years, and it was no huge surprise that he wouldn't be too unhappy with a draw, given the circumstances. However, I disagree about the draw being pre-agreed.

On #2 (Carlsen is just like Fischer), I think the difference is that Fischer generally claimed that the reason he didn't win tournaments was that opponents pre-agreed draws and that this gave them a winning advantage in spite of Fischer being better. Now, Carlsen won the Gashimov Memorial, and has never suggested that these draws in some way stopped him from winning events, but rather called them boring. He meant that an event like Gashimov Memorial got less exciting when so many games in the tournament give an impression of being totally unplayed. 

If Carlsen was right or not is not really a question, and even Mamedyarov agreeing that he does pre-agree draws isn't that big a deal either, since it has indeed been quite obvious in too many cases for anyone to doubt it. I think it might be even worse than that: in the FIDE Grand Prix in 2010 Radjabov needed a win to qualify for the Candidates. Then Mamedyarov would get the wild card of the Azeri organisers. All their other games have been very dead draws since time immemorial, and admitted by Mamedyarov to be pre-agreed draws, but in this game Mamedyarov suddenly dropped a pawn after a blunder and quickly resigned. If this game was "correct" or not is of course impossible to say.

What is the qustion is rather if Carlsen really should say these things in public? Even though he and Mamedyarov and many others know it is true, it is maybe unnecessary to state things so openly. I think Carlsen just can't stop himself from saying what he thinks, and when he says that he wouldn't be surprised if a Mamedyarov game was pre-arranged, and that he has no proof whatsoever that it was, it is probably to be a bit too blunt.

But then, Mamedyarov had no problems accusing Kurnosov of being a cheater after losing a game against him, and repeating this accusation later, with considerably less proof than Carlsen had about Mamedyarov's (admitted) pre-agreed draws...

they kinda trolled their opponents

This sort of thing (and @DeirdreSkye, you are absolutely right that pre-analyzed drawn lines amount to the same thing as pre-arranged draws) makes a real case for returning the major tournaments to the knock-out format, where a quick draw is of no benefit.

 

The basic problem is that in Round-Robin and Swiss formats, easy draws are like a bye or even a vacation.  In knockout format, draws of any length are simply a waste of time and energy.  You don't get through to the next round until you beat the player in front of you.  A more honest game, and a much more entertaining one, I'd wager.

I really dislike Magnus and in my opinion he gets away with bullshit far too often (his banter against Giri was completely  over the top, for example). But in this case I can't see what he did wrong, the accusation was correct. however, I agree with the one who said that Carlsen regularly produces boring draws himself... honestly, fuck that guy, players like Carlsen are the death of chess.

As far as can be confirmed, it was at best half correct. He accused two players having prearanged draws in the past. One admitted that he indeed has. The other did not.

There's a world of difference between playing for a draw and pre-arranging a draw.

 

Why are people so intellectually lazy that they try to lump everything into the same category? In one case, you actively discuss fixing a game in advance, in the other, you wait to see whether your opponent is in a fighting mood.

 

If you're playing Black against an elite player and they offer a draw out of the opening, there's no problem taking it unless you already have an edge.

Noobs might make a draw once every 500 games, so to them something like a 20 move draw probably seems bizarre.

So I wouldn't call it intellectually lazy, they're just ignorant about chess in general.

@deirdreskye

So they found a way for white to kill the game. So what? There are lots of those.

It was MVL's fault to play that way, he had white and made those decisions.

Carlsen could have avoided it by purposefully giving himself a near-losing (or lost) position, but that would have been dumb.

Carlsen could have acted like this was a must win game, and gone for a difficult position from move 1, but it wasn't a must win game, plus he has a WCC match coming up. He should save any good desperation-with-black ideas for then.

At a high level, if white wants a draw, black has to accept an objectively worse position to avoid it.

After 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nf6, black might have to accept an objectively lost position to avoid it.

If they decided to show up, then yes, I would.

"I never beat a healthy opponent."