Claim
Question One.
Playing match point pairs. Declarer is in 6C by East. At trick 3 he lays his hand down saying the rest are mine.
First 2 tricks are:-
AS - 8S - 4S - 2S One trick for defence.
6D - QD - 2D - 3D One trick for declarer.
Dummy Holds: -
S: 9
H: AJ4
D: 8
C: KQ5432
Declarer Holds: -
S: KJ5
H: 8
D: AK5
C: AJ76
There is no mention of any line of play, even when asked “How you playing it” still no mention of drawing trumps.
How do you rule?
Director took details and advised would make a ruling later.
Question Two.
Following this declarer says you are not ruling now then, director says no, I think, he is within his rights to make the ruling later.?
Declarer then refused to play the second board. What should happen now?
Thanks.
Comments
LAW 70 - CONTESTED CLAIM OR CONCESSION
A. General Objective
In ruling on a contested claim or concession, the Director
adjudicates the result of the board as equitably as possible to
both sides, but any doubtful point as to a claim shall be
resolved against the claimer. The Director proceeds as
follows.
......
C. There Is an Outstanding Trump
When a trump remains in one of the opponents’ hands, the
Director shall award a trick or tricks to the opponents if:
1. claimer made no statement about that trump, and
2. it is at all likely that claimer at the time of his claim
was unaware that a trump remained in an
opponent’s hand, and
3. a trick could be lost to that trump by any normal play.
It is not at all likely that claimer was unaware of the trumps in the defenders' hands and a trick could not be lost to any of those trumps by any normal play, so the claim should be accepted.
However, players do not have the right to decide when TDs give their rulings, and the White Book tells us that "Disqualification (DQ) is the default penalty for refusing to play".
The first time I tried to work out the line of play here, I miscounted declarer's tricks and thought that two heart ruffs were needed, which left me wondering about the safest way to make if trumps were 3-0. It's possible that, under that misconception, I would have played hearts before drawing trumps (with the third ruffed high). As such, it's arguably inferior but normal to go down if hearts happen to be 9-0 or 8-1. Assuming that isn't the case, though, it's hard to see declarer losing a trick here.
In general, I think the claim rules are very hard to adjudicate because you have to work out whether and when normal lines of play include lines where declarer is under a misconception. In this situation, it's very unlikely that declarer thinks that trumps have been drawn (or that the partnership holds all 13 already), so it isn't at all likely that declarer was unaware of there still being trumps out. But there are other plausible misconceptions that could lead declarer to adopt a slightly inferior line, and it can be hard to tell when or whether such lines are "normal".
Although the director is within his rights to rule later, they should (for practical purposes) tell the players a score to enter so the technology can move on.
I can't understand why declarer couldn't resolve the situation by pointing out that they can draw trumps in three rounds and throw a heart on a diamond, and ruff one heart. This was perhaps obvious to the declarer but not to defence/director. Perhaps it was not obvious to declarer - in which case they got lucky.
As for refusing to play, that seems to give the director no option but to suspend the players from the rest of session, which is the same as disqualification (see Gordon's reply). The player must be prepared to follow the director's instruction; if they disagree with the instruction, they should take it up with the tournament organiser (the club) after the session.
I think that the declarer is being silly here - how hard is it to say, "drawing trumps and I now have 11 top tricks plus a heart ruff"? Having said that, it does look pretty obvious and I would not complain if my oppo said, 'the rest are mine'. Though, if this person was a regular 'and the rest are mine' claimer, I might ask something along the lines of, how are you playing it? If they refused to give anything further than 'the rest are mine' I would call the director.
I would expect the director to accept the claim here (obviously) but also to issue an instructions that claims should be accompanied by a claim statement and that failure to make one might lead to tricks being lost that might not be had a clear statement been made.
When issuing a ruling later, I tell the table to enter 13NT XX -13 so that it is flagged on the system, then I will correct it later. I normally announce to the room to take care when looking at the results as there is an adjustment to be made.
As for refusing to play the next board - a warning should be issued that if they continue to refuse to play, then as a director I would be left with no alternative than to remove them from the rest of the event. That the issue would be taken to the committee as a disciplinary matter, in case further action would be warrantied. I would also state that should they disagree with my ruling, then an appeal can be made.
Though thinking about it, it may be that the scoring was on paper, in which case, leaving that blank for now seems appropriate also.
As the Director in question I'm glad David raised this, because I was very unhappy about this decision - I was pretty sure I was right (and pleased to have it confirmed, thank you Gordon) but unhappy about the outcome. Three points occur.
I was a playing Director, faced with a complete board's worth of cards (but for two tricks) faced up. I simply wasn't going to try to make sense of it in real time. I thought it better to look at the hand record (with the benefit of Deep) after play, when I could also take advice from a very experienced fellow player. Then and now that seemed to me the sensible way to deal with it becasue there was a further issue (see below).
To be clear, Declarer's conduct was disgraceful and, having concluded what I did (6C=) my next thought was whether it was appropriate to penalise declarer either under 70A or with a procedural penalty under 90. But I couldn't see how, or judge what would be appropriate. I suppose I could have awarded an adjusted score but there didn't seem any basis for that so, however reluctantly, I left it. Is there any basis for penalising declarer? If so, how? As to the unplayed board, I didn't know about the DQ rule but it was a club bridge w/e and it wouldn't have been an appropriate sanction. What I did was award an adjusted score of 60% to the innocent side and 0% to the offenders for the unplayed Board. Was that reasonable?
Finally the collateral difficulty created by this fracas, was that I had not played the board in question. If my memory serves this was actually the first board of the first round, so no one else had played it either. So I was now in the difficult position of knowing a possible contract and suspecting that it could be made. I thought about awarding averages but, having taken advice, decided to play and try to ignore the UI. As it happens, in the auction my partner bid to 5C and knowing what I did I felt I had to pass, so we had a poor score because some were in 3NT (+1). I still have a sneaking suspicion that despite my best efforts my bidding may have been affected. What ought I to have done?
Without hopefully sounding too "holier than thou" about it, I would never play a hand where I have seen some of the cards as director at another table.
I just say to my opponents "sorry I can't play this hand as I have seen some of the cards", and award your side and the opponents 60% each.
I think the recommended ruling in that situation, if the TD is unable to play the hand, is Av+ for the opponents but Av for the TD (WB 7.6.2.4). However, the White Book also recommends treating the knowledge as XI and trying to play normally, and awarding the artificial score only if it makes it impossible to play the board normally (although in this case, it may have done).
I assume that it was one of both of the defenders who asked this, and not the TD. Defenders are very prone to ask this but it is against their interests as it can let declarer get away with supplementing his claim statement of "the rest are mine" with something that should not be taken into consideration by the TD. He had a chance to state a line of play and he declined and he mustn't have another opportunity.
Barrie Partridge - CTD for Bridge Club Live
Yes, if you don't want to disqualify him. And I think your reason for not wanting to give the ruling immediately was also sound.
Thanks to Stayman and ais523 each helpful in its way. I'm inclinded to agree with 'holier than thou' :-), not playing it was my first instinct but I allowed myself to be peruaded otherwise. I suppose 'impossible to play' refers to the kind of situation which would have arisen had I settled the claim at the table, for then I would have had clear knowledge of all four hands and couldn't possibly have played the board. As it was I didn't really take any notice of the cards during the (rather fraught) discussion.
What excercises me in this case is 'as equitably as possible'; while the decision was correct I'm not sure that justice was done. But the absence of any response to my second point above suggests that there's no real case for adjustment, though my sense remains that a Law 90 penalty (because of declarer's behaviour) ought to be in point somehow.
Out of interest (I hope I never again have to deal with this kind of situation) what's the scoring protocol in the event of a DQ?
Thanks again to everyone who's responded.
Disqualification - if contestant has played half the boards in the session, score for opponents on boards played are retained, remaining board to be played scored as AVE+ to other side; disqualified contestant should not appear in final raking list. If contestant has not played half the boards, remove any scores and remove the contestant from the movement and the ranking list. White Book 2.4.4
Adjustments and penalties are different things, so while it was correct to award the result of the contract being made, you could also give a penalty for the behaviour. You did effectively do that for the refusal to play a board by giving 0%, but if there was further bad behaviour you could give a further behavioural penalty.
I too would have scored the second board 60% - 0%, with a report to the club committee and further disciplinary penalty if necessary.
"...not playing it was my first instinct but I allowed myself to be peruaded otherwise."
I would be keen to allow play of the board if at all possible. You could try to treat the information you gained from adjudicating the claim as "extraneous information from other sources" (which is what it is) and apply law 16D2(c). Tell the other players that you have some information about the hand and that you're going to try to play normally unless that becomes impossible. It would be even better if you could get another director or trusted player to look over the board afterwards to check there was no cause for concern. If there's another director present get them to make the ruling and allow the play. What you don't want is for your opponents to go along with it and then raise a protest when you bid and make six clubs.
Thanks again to all.
Robin, thanks - in this case it would have been really easy - first board.
Gordon, thanks again, that's helpful perspective too, were there really two offences? Declarer was certainly in breach of 68C but the real issue was the behaviour. Thanks for your note - Penny says 'small world' :-)
VixTD, this too is vey helpful advice. As it happens I was quite happy that I had my bids but when my Partner declined my slam try I had to pass