A remark on blocking sets of almost Rédei type (Q1375938)

This paper completes the classification of blocking sets of almost Rédei type in the Desarguesian planes of prime order. The notion of blocking set of almost Rédei type has been introduced by A. Blokhuis, R. Pellikaan and T. Szönyi [\textit{A. Blokhuis} and \textit{R. Pellikaan}, J. Comb. Theory, Ser. A 78, No. 1, 141-150 (1997; Zbl 0877.51010)] and it is a minimum size blocking set in \(\text{PG} (2,p)\) (hence containing \(3 {p+1 \over 2}\) points) meeting some line \(L\) in at least \({p+3 \over 2}- {p+45 \over 20}\) points \((p\) a prime number). In the above mentioned paper, the authors prove that in this case the maximum number of points of the blocking set off a line is \(p\), \(p+1\), or \(p+2\). Since all blocking sets of almost Rédei type in the cases \(p\) and \(p+1\) have been classified before (by \textit{L. Lovász} and \textit{A. Schrijver} [Stud. Sci. Math. Hung. 16, 449-454 (1981; Zbl 0535.51009)] and by \textit{A. Gács} , \textit{P. Sziklai} and \textit{T. Szönyi} [Des. Codes Cryptography 10, No. 1, 29-39 (1997; Zbl 0874.51002)] respectively), the paper under review treats the case \(p+2\). It is shown that necessarily \(p=3,5,7\) and in each case there is a unique example. The author uses mainly algebraic methods (relating a polynomial to a blocking set in the ``usual'' way).