[wyman]

I'm just curious now.

In a similar situation, if (at teams) south had finessed for an overtrick instead of taking a safety play to make his contract, would he be entitled to redress?

What if east had fumbled in a situation where the bidding indicated that he had a singleton?

And did I understand correctly that you'd not give south redress had east said "I'm sorry, two cards stuck together" at the time?

[aguahombre]

 Cascade, on 2011-September-11, 14:55, said:

Does anyone think it is interesting that east hitched on the crucial trick after opening with a sub-minimum hand?

 bluejak, on 2011-September-11, 15:46, said:

No.

This is the kind of question that can be answered "yes", but can't be answered "no" unless the person is omniscient.

[bluejak]

That is demonstrably incorrect, since I answered No and am not omniscient.

It is also fairly childish since you know perfectly well what both the asker and myself meant.

[aguahombre]

 bluejak, on 2011-September-11, 17:35, said:

That is demonstrably incorrect, since I answered No and am not omniscient.

It is also fairly childish since you know perfectly well what both the asker and myself meant.

And, you knew what I meant --jokingly that one person cannot answer for everyone. Relax.

[blackshoe]

 wyman, on 2011-September-11, 16:13, said:

I will defer to others' knowledge of common rulings, but there have been many discussions on here in which people get nitty about the differences in wording between "should," "must," "may," etc.

The laws say that when a player "should" do something, failure to do it is an infraction, albeit not often penalized. When a player "may" do something, failure to do it is not wrong. When he "does" something, that establishes correct procedure without suggesting a penalty. Other words ("must", "shall", "shall not", "must not") specify infractions that are more serious than "should" (and so should probably be penalized much more often than they are, at least IMO).

[mrdct]

 Cascade, on 2011-September-11, 11:38, said:

---

We need to know a little bit more about East-West's methods and competence. Do East-West play support doubles/redoubles? How many ♣ did East initially promise (i.e. are they playing Acol)? Did West have a fit showing jump available? Is East a noob? Do East-West systemically open 1st seat all-vul with 8hcp?

Depending on what we learn from investigating East-West's methods, I think it's quite likely that East can be placed with 9 or 10 cards in the blacks and West with 7 or 8 so on the theory of vacant spaces if you were going to take a ♥ hook you may well choose to play West for the ♥Q. If East is a competent player there is not much that can be read into a fidget, hesitation or card replacement as there is no holding where it's right to cover the ♥J.

I don't think much of declarer's line here either. With West not having lead a singleton ♣, I don't think there is any chance of ♣ being 1-7, so a ♣ exit at trick two will at the very least give you more info about the distribution on the hand, and every so often will see a trump switch depending on the standard of the game.

I'll reserve judgement for the time being until I know more about what's actually going on at this table.

[lamford]

 mrdct, on 2011-September-11, 20:18, said:

I don't think much of declarer's line here either. With West not having lead a singleton ♣, I don't think there is any chance of ♣ being 1-7, so a ♣ exit at trick two will at the very least give you more info about the distribution on the hand, and every so often will see a trump switch depending on the standard of the game.

I do not see much point to exiting with a club. You are unlikely to know how they are distributed, and East is sure to have the ace of clubs. And it does not seem relevant to the ruling, as it would hardly be SeWoG to not exit with a club! And the question is whether they play support redoubles, not support doubles.

[Cascade]

 lamford, on 2011-September-11, 14:12, said:

(I was amazed West went to 5S with Qx in hearts)

Actually the hand occurred over a month ago and I couldn't remember who bid 5♠. The auction is accurate to 5♥ then one opponent bid 5♠ - I couldn't believe either would looking at their hands - and north bid 6♥.

[barmar]

 mrdct, on 2011-September-11, 20:18, said:

I don't think much of declarer's line here either. With West not having lead a singleton ♣, I don't think there is any chance of ♣ being 1-7, so a ♣ exit at trick two will at the very least give you more info about the distribution on the hand, and every so often will see a trump switch depending on the standard of the game.

The form of scoring wasn't specified. If it's matchpoints, you may want to play for the overtrick by guessing hearts right and then pitching all your clubs on the diamonds.

[lamford]

 barmar, on 2011-September-14, 11:24, said:

The form of scoring wasn't specified. If it's matchpoints, you may want to play for the overtrick by guessing hearts right and then pitching all your clubs on the diamonds.

I wouldn't be too worried about my matchpoint score for 6♥= on a combined 22 count missing the queen of trumps and an ace. Especially as we were content with 5H a moment ago.

[olegru]

East with singleton at the moment performed some mannerism to benefit his side. He claimed it was by accident. If I believe I would not issue PP. But adjustment is automatic.

[lamford]

 olegru, on 2011-September-16, 07:48, said:

East with singleton at the moment performed some mannerism to benefit his side. He claimed it was by accident. If I believe I would not issue PP. But adjustment is automatic.

I think that the damage was very little. Without the BIT, I would imagine declaer would go down. I would therefore suggest adjusting to 20% of 6H= and 80% of 6H-1, erring in favour of the non-offenders. If some of my pollees made 6H without the BIT, then I would reconsider.

[olegru]

Opening from East and 5♠ from West suggest finessing, but absence of double and "nine-never" rule suggest otherwise. Split 50-50 OK with me, but if I cann't split - sorry East.

[pran]

 olegru, on 2011-September-16, 07:48, said:

East with singleton at the moment performed some mannerism to benefit his side. He claimed it was by accident. If I believe I would not issue PP. But adjustment is automatic.

There is no BIT problem here. The problem is East's behaviour and manner in which he played his singleton.

Sorry, somehow I answered to the wrong entry, my comment was intended for this statement:
I think that the damage was very little. Without the BIT, I would imagine declaer would go down. I would therefore suggest adjusting to 20% of 6H= and 80% of 6H-1, erring in favour of the non-offenders. If some of my pollees made 6H without the BIT, then I would reconsider.

[gombo121]

Why oh why we so easily dismiss "at his own risk" clause?

East fumbles - for whatever reasons. Can declarer deliberately ignore the fumble or can he not? Sure he can, but he deliberately chooses not to, he chooses to base his action on East's mannerism. Fine, rules allow for that, but on his own risk. Declarer decided to take his chances and failed - so what?

You have a harsh look on East's attitude? - I can see your point. So PP him, or adjust his score, or both. But declarer's score should not be adjusted in any way, next time he will try harder to get real information on card distribution from play, not from mannerism of his opps.

Split score could and I believe should be used in such situations.

[RMB1]

 gombo121, on 2011-September-19, 12:48, said:

Why oh why we so easily dismiss "at his own risk" clause?

Good question.
We certainly do dismiss that clause in favour of Law 73F.
This attitude comes from case law (jurisprudence) and TD training.

The final sentence of Law73D is applied as if it read:
Inferences from such variation may appropriately be drawn only by an opponent; but, if there is a demonstrable bridge reason for the variation, an opponent draws any inference at his own risk.

[Cascade]

 gombo121, on 2011-September-19, 12:48, said:

Why oh why we so easily dismiss "at his own risk" clause?

I think "at his own risk" applies in situations like where a player thinks and then we decide what he is thinking about and take some line of play but it turns out he had some other (bridge) problem that we overlooked then it is our bad luck.

The bridge reason for the thought needs to be demonstrable. You cant just vary your tempo and then claim you were thinking about bidding or playing some other card.

[ggwhiz]

Looking at that dummy every Bridge player with a pulse knows trumps are about to be played and more than once.

There is no excuse for East being unprepared. If 2 cards were stuck, he should have unstuck them before trick 2 let alone part way through trick 3.

[barmar]

 ggwhiz, on 2011-September-19, 22:05, said:

If 2 cards were stuck, he should have unstuck them before trick 2 let alone part way through trick 3.

Are you kidding? You can't tell ahead of time when cards will get stuck while pulling them from your hand.

In this case, the cards weren't even stuck, he mistakenly thought they were. So how was he supposed to unstick these?

[gombo121]

 Cascade, on 2011-September-19, 15:00, said:

The bridge reason for the thought needs to be demonstrable. You cant just vary your tempo and then claim you were thinking about bidding or playing some other card.

I'd like to ask "says who?", but really that is NOT the point. The point is that declarer may legitimately complain about an attempt to deceive and defender should be penalized if this would be proven. But declarer is not supposed to base his action solely on opponent's tells, and therefore he should not get a free ride doing that.

You concentrate solely on East's alleged infraction, but what South did is (or did not) is equally or even more important for his score. If he plays along with probabiliteis (as bridge is supposed to be played, I believe), he will never be deceived this way.

BTW, how does South know that East pulls the same card from his hand second time? Was he watching closely? Then he was breaching 74C5, wasn't he? Should PP be applied to him?