In mid-October last year, an elite chess player was expelled from a team championship in Spain after being accused of cheating by using a cell phone during bathroom breaks between moves. The player, Kirill Shevchenko, a Ukrainian grandmaster who represents Romania in competitions, was dismissed from the event after the phone was found in the stall he was using. The bathroom was located outside the playing hall. Shevchenko’s opponent, Francisco Vallejo Pons, complained he had been going to the bathroom for lengthy periods during games. A cell phone can be used to obtain assistance from a computer programme.
According to an article by Colin Mc Gourty in Chess.com, Shevchenko said he had a problem and had to visit the toilet. The article continued: “The arbiter reminded the player that it was necessary to ask permission to visit the toilet located outside the playing hall in a common area with two cubicles and three urinals. The visits continued, with the arbiter asking a member of the organizing committee to investigate.” A cell phone was found in the cubicle that Shevchenko was using, and a note on the phone corresponded to Shevchenko’s handwriting on his score sheet.
The chief arbiter Oscar Bruno de Prado Rodriguez scored two losses for Shevchenko’s two completed games, one a draw and the other a win. A Spanish newspaper had reported that Shevchenko “had made several moves very rapidly, seemingly without any reflection, immediately after returning from the bathroom”. The Romanian Chess Federation said in a statement that Shevchenko had denied the allegations and that unless it had “solid evidence” it would support him.
Shevchenko, 22, was born in Ukraine but switched to the Romanian Chess Federation. He became a grandmaster at 14 years and nine months old and is now ranked No. 69 in the ELO world rankings. His finest accomplishments include winning the 2021 European Team Chess Championship with Ukraine and the individual Lindores Abbey Blitz in Riga in the same year. In the blitz encounter Shevchenko came ahead of Fabiano Caruana and Arjun Erigaisi, top players from the USA and India respectively.
