Lots of players are bureaucracies. Give them 6 hours and there'd be more than a few take 5 hours and 55 minutes for 20 moves. I think the time control is fine but the lack of an increment isn't. Give a 30 second increment and there is no reason anybody ought ever flag, even if their play would naturally end up degenerating in quality if they mismanaged their time. As humorous as it was for me watching Ivanchuk completely freak out when he was near flagging against Carlsen I also think it was an indignity that he shouldn't have to suffer through, and it was only possible because of no increment.

Do you not feel that this is an "indignity" he himself should be responsible for not getting subjected to, rather than the tournament system itself protecting him from it? If, like you say, players exist who will take 5 hours and 55 minutes to make 20 moves if they have 6 hours on the clock, isn't that, as they say, "their problem"? Why is no one "ought to" never flag if their time management is as poor (?) as taking 5:55 out of 6:00 for 20 moves?

FWIW I'm not a serious chess player at all, but I find time management in chess to be pretty interesting, and from a strictly casual point of view it seems like one of those things which some players seem to be hilariously bad at, and something where certain players can gain a significant (and, imo, deserved) advantage from. I don't think an increment seems to be needed in classical chess, though I might be inconsistent on that since I think it's a good thing in something like 3min online chess.

In classical chess the clock is meant to ensure games finish in a set amount of time, not to be the means by which the game is decided. A 30 second increment ensures games finish in a reasonable amount of time while simultaneously never directly deciding the result of the game. Chess is hurt in that there is no real 'small punishment' that could be inflicted for violating the time. Imagine if in basketball your team immediately lost the game if you went beyond the shot clock! Yeah you could argue 'well they shouldn't go over the shot clock time then' but it would certainly not be a positive change to the game. For starters there'd be less action for the fans, no different than in chess. Watching somebody sweat out 20 moves on a 30s per move timer is much more interesting than seeing a game just immediately end without result on the board, similar to draws in unclear positions.

"In classical chess the clock is meant to ensure games finish in a set amount of time, not to be the means by which the game is decided."

Citation needed?

I mean I don't think it's an unreasonable position, I'm just not sure it's the only non-unreasonable position, and definitely not that it's the official "this is what classical chess is meant to be like" position. I also don't accept that chess is about maximizing spectator action, and if that it really was what it was about, it seems to me all top level events would be played with a 5 minute clock, which to me seems like a strong indicator that it's not what it's really about.

I'm a Euro so I don't really know basketball well enough to comment on your analogy.

I like your suggestion and wouldn't mind a 30 second per move situation. But I should comment on the analogy as I don't think it matches.

In basketball there is a mutual clock and the victory goes to whoever has the edge in points at the end. Thus, originally, teams could run the clock down purposefully in order to play a shorter, higher variance few possessions at the end which lowered the effects of long-term domination by a superior player. Thus the shot clock was introduced in order to penalize individual teams for taking excess time, on a "per move" basis.

In chess they already have individual clocks and only the staller gets forced to eventually rush, so the "run down the game and go crazy at the end hoping to gain a tiny edge in the chaos" strategy can't be used. And since there is one overall clock in time, they can give a game loss to the person who runs out without it warping things too much. In basketball, if they gave each team a total 24 minutes, they could also give a loss to the team that runs out without it totally ruining the game. But since basketball is a collection of individual possessions, they can assess tiny losses of points for running out of clock on each individual "move." In chess this isn't an option and thus there must be an overall loss given in total.

Anyway, I do think your original suggestion is fine, but I just wanted to clarify the differences between the clock systems in the two sports.

Well you could also say the same about chess. Previously high level games were played with no clock whatsoever. Players like Morphy were renowned for their incredibly fast play, but other opponents could and would spend many hours per game. I think this also is appropriate in response to Fabian's comment asking for citation. The clock was added to the game exclusively to ensure the games finish in some reasonable amount of time. In fact, at first, losing the game wasn't even the penalty, but rather a monetary fine! It was a result of the fact that many players in the past would try to turn chess into an endurance sport intentionally spending hours and hours per game just to try to tire out/frustrate their opponents. In basketball stalling while ahead leads directly to a victory; in chess it may be more indirect but stalling with no intentions other than stalling could and did certainly help plenty.

betfair.com has an in play market, but its not very popular so you are unlikely to get many bets matched at any reasonable price

There should be an increment and there is no good reason not too.

btw, chess can be even more frantic with increment than without. Just try playing some 3/2 instead of 5/0 blitz over a real board and you'll know what i mean. Leads to never-ending clock-banging time scrambles.

Most chess players/fans generally don't find clock management to be an especially interesting skill with respect to classic time controls, so imposing an increment (rather than just giving an open pool of time) diminishes the importance of that component in a way which tends to make people happier.

It doesn't promise to have any meaningful impact on the tourney results, but the Ivanchuk/Svidler looks like it might be really interesting (particular to a player like me who only plays e4 as white, only plays e5 as black, and plays a lot of low-rating blitz.)

Meanwhile Radjabov seems dead in the water to me (after 11. ... f5) - not because there's any flaw whatsoever with his position, with equal players it's just a really interesting position and probably totally equal. The problem is he's playing Carlsen, and I don't see any way you can play an imbalanced aggressive line against Magnus and not get blown off the board, if your name is anything other than Houdini. Should also be a fascinating game though.

Yes smells like a repeat of Carlsen-Grischuk with all the structural weaknesses

I'm just watching a feed of the moves, not actual video of the players. Can anyone please confirm for me whether or not Svider and Ivanchuk pulled out cigarettes after that massive release of tension?

I think I've had the position after move 19 before with both colours.

Gelfand-Kramnik move 19 is interesting. Gelfand's entire setup is aimed at a pretty straight forward kingside attack. Kramnik inexplicably removes his solitary defender away from his kingside allowing white a straight forward tactical conversion into a win. I'm positive Gelfand instantly saw it. He instead decides to retreat one of his pieces away from the attack for no reason other than he must have figured that there's simply no way Kramnik could have missed such a simple idea so HE must be the one missing something.

.. and Magnus is getting smoked now. wlrstradamus fails again

ruh roh carlsen

Warning, this post contains computer analysis of a game in progress:

lol both getting low on time too with ~20 minutes and 17 moves left. carlsen sacking exchange seems like the necessary play but not sure black can convert with that structure

seems like the mistake was 21. Qe4 instead of Qg4? or maybe even trying to punish the isolated doubled c pawns in the first place?

By the way, if anyone's wondering how big of an upset this would potentially be, here are the odds my model had for all four games today:

Carlsen (W) vs. Radjabov (B)
+39.4% =53% -7.6%

Aronian (W) vs. Grischuk (B)
+36.2% =55.8% -8%

Gelfand (W) vs. Kramnik (B)
+10.5% =73.5% -16%

Ivanchuk (W) vs. Svidler (B)
+22% =67.5% -10.5%

i dont get 25 ... f2, is there something there im not seeing?

from chessbomb:
whats houdini say now?

Houdini says:

rooks like open files, maybe white was going to get some sort of a blockade with rf2

carlsen really under 1 minute with 7 moves to go?

nope chessbomb was off, 1:03 6 moves to 40

yeah I think f2 is pretty natural even if it is objectively not a good or precise move.