gordontd

I think you should bid 2♠. The constraints of L27D do not apply because the call was accepted under L27A, rather than being corrected under L27B1.

Hm, the thread title on which I imagine most people based their vote said "first seat".

I'm surprised your players know whether or not there is a sit-out, and in which direction, before they take their seats. At my club we have a policy of making NS sit out wherever possible. Because we usually have two sets of boards we can do that with most movements, but occasionally we'll have a Bowman or a Share-&-Relay without having a second set of boards and then we would need to have EW sitting out. I think EW players welcome that they get to play more in return for moving, and most NS pairs recognise it as a fair deal. If they don't like it, they can always sit EW.

Actually, I was thinking of speed limits when I wrote it: the 30mph limit (in the UK) was not chosen because people will then drive at 40mph; it was chosen because that was considered to be the limit that makes the greatest difference in mortality. And when people fail to respect it, the solution chosen was not to lower it further, but to enforce it better.

This doesn't seem like a good reason: it would be an even simpler rule to use the stop-card before all bids, but it would have an undesirable outcome so we don't do that even though it would make a simpler rule. I think a more plausible reason is that a jump-bid by an opponent is quite likely to catch you unprepared, and so more likely to create UI unless a consistent pause is mandated. One might present the argument that if the required pause were a bit less, people would be less inclined to shorten it.

No reason lefty can't have a balanced ten-count.

Easy game, when you can see all the hands.

If you have suit-quality requirements for an overcall, there's no reason why he can't have a bad five-card suit.

This hand is a fair way short of 9 sure tricks. If you do rebid 3♦, partner will know to bid 3NT with a spade stop and a partial diamond fit. Lacking either of those things, you'll probably be happier in 3♦.

I don't know what made me do it - maybe that it looked like a 5♣ bid.

The way I've seen this happen is that the boards are put on the table out of order. Two players take out their hands, then another player sees the boards are not in order and "corrects" them before the two remaining players take out their hands. This happened in the Tollemache about three years ago when another EBU TD and I were playing at the table.

Yes, it does show up the problem with not alerting above 3NT, as many authorities decree, but we always knew there were circumstances when this might cause trouble. Personally, although I might make a few more exceptions to it, I think the rule has more advantages than disadvantages. I like that I'm able to make my best guess in murky slam auctions, without having been constrained by UI from partner's alerts.

5♣ from me.

I didn't understand what your original sig was trying to convey :)

Since you know you would be in a 4-3 fit at best, and you already had an uncomfortable choice being made to bid when you didn't want to, you don't want partner to compete, do you? Life would be easier if he had already done a little less competing.

+1

They probably had a fair idea when East bid 4♠, at which moment it was not too late for a L21B1a change of call.

There's no legal basis for scoring them as NP - point the director towards L12C2 for guidance on how to score it. NP gives a pair their session score for a missing board - for either pair who scored well, your director has effectively awarded two good scores for being involved in making those boards unplayable. That cannot be correct.

This sounds like an argument against bidding 2♠.

I just asked three people at the club what they thought the original sequence & explanation showed: the first, a 26 year-old regular tournament player, looked at me as though I was mad for asking, but when pushed to answer the question said that of course it showed a weak-two in hearts. The other two were both familiar with the mechanism, and were equally clear that of course it showed what it did. So I won't get caught out by this again, but I certainly wouldn't describe it that way if I were to play it.

I think it's reasonable to expect them to ensure their opponents have understood their explanation. Since the pair at the table, the TD's at the event, and David Stevenson and I among others, didn't, I think they've probably fallen short of that.

Oh, I agree the first meaning is far more common. But in the context of the explanation, as given to me by the player the next morning, I understood it the other way until she gave me further guidance - which I don't think she did to the players at the table. Which is why I think the explanation was not really good enough.

So you get the benefit of both colour schemes.

You're welcome to play in the pink room if you prefer. :)

Nothing that I heard or have since seen written suggests that she said "it asks me to make a transfer to my major". Had she said that, I doubt we would be discussing this. When my partner responds 2H to my 1NT opening bid, what do I do? I transfer to spades, as requested. And, in answer to Rik's point above, although it is common that hearts are a transfer to spades, I also play in some situations (especially at the four level) that clubs transfer to hearts and diamonds to spades.