Adjusted Score
OnLine Again!
East was having connectivity problems in a Pairs Tourney.
Not entirely clear what or how. He was never shown as disconnected but he was 'frozen'
The round was 'Clocked', and consequently Bd4 was never played at that table.
It seems to me this is a rare situation where Av+ / Av is justified, see White Book 4.1.1.1
NS are in no way 'at fault' so Av+ seems right for them.
And EW are suffering from an outside influence (connectivity)
Do you agree?
Comments
The White Book does however consider unexpected illness, delays on roads etc. though as cause for an Ave- (though pairs can be removed from the ranking list altogether in problems persist, as opposed to being marked as disqualified). As such there is a very fine line between Av+/Av and Av+/Av-, and in general the White Book is opposed to giving out more than 100% total for a board unless a player from another table is involved (this ensures that the ranks of other non-involved pairs are not overly disadvantaged by one table having a >100% total).
I guess this is very much open to interpretation though - perhaps an Av- in the first instance but Average for repeated instances (or half and half in something similar to 3.3.9)? Alternatively, you could argue that pairs with known connectivity issues should perhaps be playing in team matches instead of tournaments as they are less time-pressured (and therefore an Av- for repeated issues is more appropriate), though at the same time you don't want to discourage people from playing.
In any case, an Av+ is definitely right for NS.
The sort of connectivity issue where connections get "frozen" without breaking is normally due to packets being lost or delayed, without the connection being reset. From the point of view of the person who is struggling, it looks like everyone else is playing slowly.
This type of issue can be fixed by the frozen player simply by re-logging into BBO in another browser tab, if they're aware that it's happening. But it often isn't immediately obvious that that's what is going on.
I think the best way a Director can deal with this is to let the player in question know how to recognise a frozen connection and fix it, and then give them Av- in future if they fail to fix the issue when it occurs.
While I don't disagree with the consequences and that a person causing recurrent problems would warrant an Av-, ...
I'd be a little careful in assuming that:
a) the person understands the cause of the problems - many players are only just able to cope with using BBO, and
b) the person is technically capable of fixing them - both on competency and the issue being local.
Many slowness/freezing problems require more than a new browser session - perhaps a reboot of computer or router, or perhaps it's even just a bad day at the Internet provider.