Emirates Team Blitz Championship
On Friday 5th December 2025, the Emirates Stadium will play host to a new event for the London Chess Classic - a team blitz tournament. Teams of four players will compete in a Swiss tournament for the title of Emirates Team Blitz Champions. Entrants to this tournaments are also able to spectate on the main event of the 2025 XTX Markets London Chess Classic or listen to the live grandmaster commentary.
Please note: the capacity for this tournament is 25 teams (100 players). Please book early to avoid disappointment.
Tournament Rules
Who can enter?
The Emirates Team Blitz Championship is open to teams of four players. All four players must be named at the time of entry and one must be designated as the captain. No reserves or substitutes are permitted. There are no restrictions on ratings of the players.
Venue
The Emirates Team Blitz Championship will take place at the Emirates Stadium.
Schedule/format
The tournament will begin at 5pm and finish at approximately 8.30pm. The format will be a 9-round Swiss tournament.
Board order
The board order is entirely at the discretion of the captain without limitation. This may be changed until 15 minutes before the scheduled start of the tournament. The team’s board order will apply for the entirety of the tournament – it cannot be changed from match-to-match.
Entry fee
£60 per team
Free entry for
teams with at least two GMs or IMs
teams with at least two female players (British citizens only)
teams with at least two players U25 (must be born on or after 26/11/2000) (British citizens only)
teams with at least two active CSC tutors.
Please note: to receive a free entry, teams in the categories above must guarantee to play all 9 rounds. Teams will be required to pay the standard entry fee upfront and will have that refunded at the end of the tournament on completion of all the 9 matches.
All players, irrespective of their country of FIDE registration, must either be Gold members of the ECF or each pay a £20 Pay-to-Play surcharge. This includes players in teams that qualify for free entry - the Pay-to-Play surcharge will not be refunded.
Time Control
3+2
Prize fund
TBD
Byes
Byes are not permitted in this event and all teams are expected to play every game.
Defaults
A team will not be paired for subsequent rounds if the team:
loses two or more games by forfeit in two matches, or
loses all four boards by forfeit in one match.
Pairings
Pairings for the first round will be published by 4.45pm on the day of the event with subsequent pairings being published as soon as possible.
The tournament will be paired using the FIDE Chess Olympiad Pairing Rules, except that the starting rank will be determined by the three highest-rated players in the team. The rating lists being used will be:
FIDE Blitz rating (December 2025)
ECF Blitz rating (December 2025)
An estimated rating assigned by the organiser, based on any other FIDE or ECF ratings the player may have.
Each team match consists of four games: one for each player against the other team. The tournament pairings will assign white to board 1 and 3 for one team, and white to board 2 and 4 for their opponents.
Late pairings
The Organisers may permit teams to enter (or register) after the pairings have been published for Round 1 of a tournament. In general, these teams will score 0 points in the rounds they have missed. However, the team may be paired against another team in this category, that has entered the same tournament, and that game shall be played as though part of the tournament; and thus, they will count towards the tournament scores, and be ECF and FIDE rated.
Prize Calculation
Rankings will be determined by:
Matchpoints (2 for a win, 1 for a draw, 0 for a loss)
Olympiad Sonneborn-Berger (Chennai)
Gamepoints
Olympiad Sum of Opponents Matchpoints (Chennai).
Prize lists
Full prize lists for each tournament will be published online as soon as possible at the end of the tournaments. The event organisers will contact all prize winners as soon as possible to arrange for the payment of prizes
Fair play policy
Please read the London Chess Classic Festival Fair Play Policy for rules governing players’ conduct during games.
Appeals Procedure
Decisions of an arbiter may be appealed to the Appeals Committee provided that
Such an appeal is received in writing within 30 minutes of the arbiter’s decision, and
Such an appeal is accompanied by an appeal fee of £50 which will be returned if the appeal is successful.
The Committee for the Elite Tournament will serve as the Appeals Committee for the Festival.
Disputes
In all disputes, the Chief Arbiter’s decision is final.
Ratings
All tournaments will be submitted to the ECF and FIDE for ECF rating and FIDE rating. It is a condition of playing in the London Chess Classic that the data submitted at the time of entry will be forwarded to the ECF and FIDE as required to enable the games played to be rated by the ECF and FIDE.
All entrants must have a FIDE Identification Number at the time of submitting their entry, unless they wish their FIDE nationality to be England. English players without a FIDE Identification Number will have one created at the time the rating files are submitted by FIDE. Please note: At the time of writing, changing this nationality later costs 50 Euros.
Players registered to the Russian or Belarusian chess federations remain banned from FIDE events and will not be able to take part in the London Chess Classic.
Parental responsibility
Parents or guardians are responsible for their children during the tournament. The organisers and helpers are not able to act “in loco parentis” and are not able to take responsibility for any child’s actions, or for the actions of anyone that may affect your child. The Emirates Stadium does not allow children under the age of 16 to be unaccompanied. All players under the age of 16 must have a parent or guardian on-site at all times.
Liability
The organisers accept no responsibility for any loss, theft or accident during the tournament.
Right to refuse entry
The Chief Organiser reserves the right to refuse entry without being required to state a reason, and to transfer players between tournaments at any time.
Zero Tolerance to Abuse
The Chief Arbiter is empowered to expel a player from all tournaments entered, either for a number or rounds, a number of days, or in their entirety, who shows dissent by word or action towards an arbiter, or any member of staff connected with the London Chess Classic.
