Law 46 B
Something that arose recently, but had no consequencies to the result, has caused a bit of a dilemma. The problem is about "(except when declarer's different intention is incontrovertible)".
Declarer leads (say) a club towards dummy. There are no Clubs in dummy and dummy only has the 9 and 6 of trumps. Declarer says (at the same time as LHO plays the 10 of trumps) "ruff..ah ". Has declarer called a card and a trump is "deemed" to have been called and a low trump should be played or is it an incomplete or invalid designation of a card and a change of card can be made?
As I have said nothing "hangs" on this but just wanted to be sure in my own mind.
Many Thanks
CMOT_Dibbler
Comments
Yes. It's a case of : Ruff means Ruff. :)
Alan
I view it as an incomplete designation. No card has yet been called for.
Then again, I might have misinterpreted the "ruff..ah". If we interpret the "ah" as "oh, curses" then, as already stated, the ruff was called for and the trump 6 has been played. I initially read the "ah" as a space-filler while declarer considered whether to ruff high or low.
If declarer is thinking fast enough ..." ruff with the Ace please" should do the trick via L46B4 ... but failing something of this nature, as noted above S6 has been played.
Peter
Although this approach is not without risk. It might not be convincing enough to a sufficiently cynical TD. I would be inclined in this case to rule incomplete designation, as others have.
Most people say 'ruff' to mean play the lowest trump card.
That's how I would take it.
He might have said : Ruff with the six.. but he didn't.
Alan
If declarer's LHO has followed suit or discarded "ruff" would have been a sufficient designation to rule that dummy's lowest trump was played. It is therefore clear to me that it was declarer's intention to ruff small. I don't think there was a contrary intention, let alone an incontrovertible one. What has happened, of course, is that declarer failed to see LHO's card in time.
I think this is analogous to the situation where declarer leads towards the AQ in dummy, and calls "Queen" without having noticed that in fact LHO has played the King. The Queen, in that case, and the small trump in this, are played cards.
I agree. Only if the player had managed to correct himself before finishing saying the word "ruff" would I allow a change.
Thanks all for your time and thoughts. I appreciate the example Abbeybear.
Another to go into my little "red" book
CMOT_Dibbler
Isn't it a 'little pale yellow book' now?