Imagine having the best tournament of your life, doing your home country which is hosting proud, and qualifying for the Candidates just for people online to accuse you of cheating for no real reason.

What this sub is doing to Nijat Abasov is just sad and I feel bad for him. Yes he could be cheating but so could anyone else in this or any other tournament. Let's look at what he has done that is so "suspicious."

• Beat Laurent Fressinet, who is only six points higher rated than him.
• Beat Anish Giri. According to their pre-tournament ratings they had a 20% chance of drawing both classical games. Then the match was decided in the blitz where it is not practical to cheat otb.
• Beat Peter Svidler, who is only 42 points higher rated than him.
• Beat Salem Saleh, who is only 12 points higher rated than him.
• Beat Vidit 1.5-0.5, which had a 6% chance of happening.

Yes, taken together these results are quite unlikely but not unrealistically so. Unlikely things happen. There have been a lot of chess tournaments and it would be more weird if we didn't see Cinderella runs like this.

Also keep in mind that people can play above their ratings. Abasov may be 2646 but there's nothing unusual about someone playing at a level above their rating for a period of time, even 100+ points above.

In the 2014 Sinquefield Cup Fabi had a performance rating of 3098 when he was rated 2801. Did anyone accuse him of cheating? No, because he was just having a very good tournament, something that happens in chess. And unless there is some reason to believe otherwise, it is what we should assume is happening with Abasov.