The 55th edition of a popular ladies’ tournament in Serbia brought together strong female players from different countries. Video Assistant Referee (VAR) and idChess broadcast were used in the competition for the first time.

The round robin with classical time control in Belgrade featured players from five countries: Lu Miaoyi and Xu Yuanyuan from China, Sandra Djukic, Elif Mehmed, Vera Vujovic and Sofia Pogorelskikh from Serbia, Aleksandra Maltsevskaya and Anna Kubicka from Poland, Evgeniya Doluhanova from Ukraine, and Bhakti Kulkarni from India.

VAR was used in the competition for the first time. Video Assistant Referee (VAR) is the idChess technology that helps chess arbiters to make the right decisions in controversial situations. Through video recording and artificial intelligence, VAR shows which moves were made, allowing the arbiter to analyze controversial moments quickly.

The arbiter can scrutinize the controversial episode using VAR and if necessary pause the video, rewind using the navigation on the timeline with the marks. The game broadcast is suspended until the circumstances are clarified.

After the game, organizers and arbiters have a recording of chess notation (also broadcast and saved on the platform live.idchess.com) and a video recording of the game. The game is securely recorded in two ways, making any errors impossible.

“I am happy to see VAR, Video Assistant Referee, for the first time in Serbia. This technology brings a guarantee of a fair game to chess. The decisions of arbiters will be objective since they are based on facts and the game records with VAR,” said Vladimir Sakotic, organizer of the tournament. “In addition to VAR, idChess helps us with broadcasting. People can watch games, both in real time and recorded.”

The last round and award ceremony were held on March 10. Aleksandra Maltsevskaya (Poland) emerged as the winner with an excellent score of 7.5/9.  Elif Mehmed (Serbia) and Lu Miaoyi (China) finished just a half-point behind the champion with the former taking second place thanks a greater number of victories.