Looking for examples of contested claim director rulings
To get a better idea of what is "careless" and what is "irrational" regarding contested claims, I'd like to find many examples of close decision cases.
Examples:
- Two trumps out, one in declarer's hand and one forgotten about lower trump in a defender's hand and declarer claims all.
- Two trumps out, one in declarer's hand and one forgotten about HIGHER trump in a defender's hand and declarer claims all. (Is declarer always forced to lead his trump early potentially losing several tricks in a side suit?)
- Declarer claims all and has to cash his tricks in a particular order to cash all of them due to entry issues.
Are there documents from EBU, WBF, ACBL, ABF, DBF, and others that have many examples of (moderately) difficult to rule contested claim cases?
(Side comment - I wish the standards of what is assumed to rule in these cases was standardized so that on every continent the rulings would be the same.)
Comments
Not a record of cases, though the last two examples were based on actual cases, but this is the EBU document about adjudicating claims. Note that the word "irrational" is no longer used in the claims laws and we tend instead to talk about "worse than careless".
The general principle underlying these cases is that a player who thinks all his cards are good might play them in any order, so the claim will be decided based on them being played in the most disadvantageous way. Where this breaks down is when the most disadvantageous way is so tortuous (switching back and forth to unguard as many suits as possible before losing the lead) as to not be able to be considered "normal".
When it is simply about a question of entries, one has to take into account the standard of player and whether or not he has indicated any awareness of the entry position, either in comments or by the line of play taken.
If part of the claim is running a long suit which declarer thinks is good but is not, is he allowed to change plans to the only other possible like of play that has any chance of success?
Does it matter if the card in the long suit that needs to drop is a ten or jack but in another case the card that needs to drop is a 7-spot (with regards to declarer recognizing the suit did not run after all?
A claim of this sort was appealed to me some years ago in a Portland Pairs. Declarer won the opening lead in 6NT and at some point in the middle of the play claimed 12 tricks which included 5 spade tricks, available unless they were 4-1 which they were. The ruling by the TD, the TD he consulted and upheld by me on appeal was that declarer was -3 as when she continued with the 4th spade trick the defence would win, and cash some winners. The grounds for the appeal were that declarer would have noticed and played an alternative line for -1. I dismissed that as an argument and kept the deposit
My impression is that this is the view we take in the EBU, but I think most other countries are more generous and allow claimers to wake up if there is a surprisingly bad break. My observation is that in practice players don't always notice these bad breaks and of course they might have miscounted such that even if they are paying attention they don't realise there is a loser to come.
The White Book says:
8.70.9 Claim can be seen to break down – when can claimer change line?
Suppose it is explicit or implicit in declarer’s claim that a long suit will be good (if played from
the top) but in fact the suit is breaking badly and the long cards in the suit are not good. Is it
normal for declarer to continue to play the suit, when the bad break has come to light, or in
adjudicating the claim, can declarer be assumed to try a different suit for the tricks they need?
The L&EC is aware that different attitudes to this question are sometimes expressed, in both
rulings and TD training. Some would allow claimer the benefit of noticing that the suit has
broken badly (for instance) and to depart from their original line.
The interpretation/implementation of Law 70 in the EBU remains that it is careless, and
therefore ‘normal’, for the claimer not to pay attention to cards played by the other side, and
that claimer will continue with the original line, subject to §8.70.8.
Thanks for the information.
This is one of the reasons for my previous side comment about wanting rulings to be the same no matter what continent you are playing on.
Along those lines, but not a claim, people say " play the clubs from the top" or similar quite regularly... If they notice that the suit is not splitting, they are not obligated to play club after club until they lose a trick. Once they spot a bad split they can change their initial indication of play and do something else instead.
However, when they make a claim along the lines of "the clubs are all good plus these top cards in other suits" they are stating that they know that the clubs are running and so there is no reason to pay attention to anything the ops are playing. I would then say that rather than perhaps playing the clubs till losing tricks, that they empty their hand of As and Ks and then embark on clubs... that way they may lose more tricks.
It shows the importance of making a specific statement of line of play when claiming. Rather than Clubs are all good these Aces and Kings are good etc... state, playing the clubs from the top, throwing losing hearts etc, then cashing the Aces and Kings. At least this way you play the clubs till losing a trick and can perhaps get a better result (better yet, only claim when 100% correct - I normally play till either hand or dummy is good then state that while showing my hand)