draw counts as a win for Black). The player who wins the draw of lots may choose which color they play. Coin flip As a last resort, ties are broken by a random process such as a coin flip . Order of tiebreak criteria Harry Golombek points out deficiencies in most of the tie-break systems and recommends a playoff if there is time. If not, he recommends Sonneborn-Berger and then the player who has the most wins. For Swiss tournaments, he recommends the Buchholz system and the Cumulative system . For Swiss tournaments for individuals (not teams), FIDE's 2019 recommendations are: Buchholz Cut 1 (the Buchholz score reduced by the lowest score of the opponents); Buchholz (the sum of the scores of each of the opponents of a player); The greater number of wins; The greater number of wins with Black pieces, not counting forfeits. The U.S. Chess Federation recommends these as the first four tie-breaking methods to be used : Modified Median Solkoff Cumulative Cumulative opponent's score See also Tiebreaker References Chess tournament systems Rules of chess Swiss-system tournaments