Card remaining at the end of play
After all 13 tricks have been played North is left with a card. All players agree that everyone played to every trick and there were no revokes. The cards are counted and there are 52. Tracing the actual play is difficult because East and South have picked up their cards. What should the TD do and rule please?
Comments
Hi Ian. I think we need a little more information. For instance was the trick count agreed before North found they had a card left? What was the agreed trick count (did declarer make the contract or go down). Was North Declarer? Dummy? or a defender? Who led to the last trick? When was the director called? Who called them? Who decided to count the cards and was the director present? Was the director present when everyone agreed that everyone had played to every trick? When did East and South shuffle their cards and put them back in the board?
I think that if I had been called after all of the above events I would probably ask what the agreed trick count was and score the board accordingly. I would also give additional information about calling the director as soon as an irregularity has been discovered and leave the director to resolve the issue. If the trick count hadn't been agreed then, as a playing director I might score it as average minus for both pairs, get the players to check their hands with the hand print out and then move everyone for the next round.
If the director can determine which trick was defective, Law 67B1 applies (assuming trick 13 was not defective). North has no choice about which card to contribute to the defective trick, the ownership of the defective trick will not change, and there will be a 1-trick revoke penalty.
If the director cannot determine which trick was defective, they make a ruling which allows play to continue (Law 85B). Since play is over, the ruling would normally be to let the agreed number of tricks stand.
Mathematically, this is only possible if someone played the same card twice (which is physically possible, if a player accidentally or even deliberately picks it up from a quitted trick). So it's probably possible to figure out who committed the irregularity by seeing who has 12 cards remaining in their quitted tricks pile (which will be possible even after the player picked up their cards – even if they have been shuffled you can still count them).
(Technically, due to a wording mistake in Law 44C, there may not even have been an irregularity – Law 44C unintentionally gives permission for players to play cards that are not in their hand if they would be unable to follow suit otherwise. In practice, the offending wording is universally ignored by both Directors and players, because the game wouldn't be particularly playable if the Law were taken literally.)
ais523 I understand your comment. However, experience tells me that once players start touching quitted tricks you cannot depend on what they are saying. We don't have information from the OP to say exactly what took place. It could be that they were all chatting after agreeing the result and East knocked a quitted card on the floor as they were picking the tricks up, and didn't notice. Declarer picks it up and just says I have another card here! Now they all start counting and eventually the totals all come to 52. No one knows which cards were counted or by whom. Now South is in a cleft stick as they know they should never have picked their cards up and will probably agree to anything that anyone says. Once one agrees something everyone else piles in saying "yes" to any point raised. With the majority of Bridge players mathematics just doesn't come into it. By the way, normally the chat continues until the next players stand over the people chatting well after the move has been called.
I am glad you didn't say mathematically impossible because we all know that million to one chances do become nailed on certainties. Bless you Terry.
P.S. shouldn't that be Law 44D?
Law 44C says that the obligation to follow suit takes precedence over all other requirements of the Laws, presumably including the requirement to play only cards that are in your hand. The "any card" in 44D could also be interpreted as allowing the play of cards that aren't in your hand, but it's less clear a permission than that in 44C.
Writing rules for a game after you've already learned how to play it can be very difficult – it's "obvious" to any bridge player that you can only play a card that you haven't played already, and can't play cards from other players' hands, but if someone were new to the game and trying to learn it from the Laws, it wouldn't be at all clear that players are restricted to playing cards from their own hand (in fact, I'm having trouble figuring out where the Laws require that for plays to a trick other than the lead). I can easily imagine a new player attempting to play cards from dummy on declarer's turn, for example.
I can see your point of "maybe someone picked up a dropped card and now nobody's quite sure what happened or which cards belong to which hand", but in such a case it's quite plausible that the board has been fouled, so the Director's primary immediate concern should be to ensure that all the cards go back into the correct pockets (so as to ensure that the irregularity doesn't end up spreading to other tables).
Assuming you aren’t talking about playing cards from other peoples hands, as covered by laws such as Law 45A…
Yes, it’s kind of backwards, starting at 44G, but a legitimate way to write it.
Law 44A. Lead to a Trick. That’s the lead to a new trick, not the opening lead (Law 41). 44B, playing a card in turn to the new trick. 44C, players must follow suit if possible, 44D can play any suit if they can’t follow suit. 44E the trick is won by the highest trump card or 44F the trick is won by the highest card of the suit led (41C/44A) if there are no trump suit card played. 44G the right to lead under 44A is granted to the player that won the last trick.