Chess is quiet, very quiet. What’s not possible is for someone to audibly stomp around – like Alireza Firouzja at the Candidates Tournament. Now the network is shaking.
April 15, 2024, 4:35 p.m
Will Alireza Firouzja come barefoot soon? © Maria Emilianova/Fide
Excitement at the big chess tournament in Toronto. The teenage Parisian grandmaster Alireza Firouzja calls on the internet for help after the ninth round on Sunday on X:
“Disgraceful action by the main referee Marghetis towards me (…). In the middle of the game at the most intense moment, (…) the main referee came to me and told me to stop walking around because my shoes were making noise on the wooden floor. He told me, I was supposed to bring new shoes tomorrow, but I have regular shoes that are approved and have been wearing them for more than a year. This distracted me a lot during the game and I completely lost my focus “Organizers said that this referee needs to be punished. Honestly, unprofessional things like this happen to me in almost every tournament and it really brings me to the point of expulsion.”
