Another Claim

[lamford]

[hv=pc=n&s=sakqjt5hakdkqjcak&w=s98764hqjt9d98c98&n=s32h432da32c65432&e=sh8765dt7654cqjt7&d=s&v=b&b=7&a=4np5dp7nppp]399|300[/hv]

In last night's Hogwarts Pairs, a 9 ³/₄ table Howell, the above hand occurred.

West led the queen of hearts. Declarer won and laid down the ace of spades. East showed out and declarer conceded one down. Dummy commented that all the spades are dropping, but East said that declarer did not know that. The TD was called.

 

How do you rule?

 

a ) if the TD ruled that you would reach a two card ending where you would believe that an opponent had 9x of spades remaining, and you would then exit with the low spade, on the basis that you thought the two lines were equal, and therefore declarer was two down, would you appeal as declarer?

 

b ) if the TD ruled that the only normal line was to play the twelve winners first and then win the thirteenth trick perforce, would you appeal as a defender?

 

c ) if the TD, a disciple of Burn, ruled that the declarer would cash the rounded winners and exit with a low spade, and the contract was six off, would you take action as Chief Tournament Director?

 

d ) if the TD, a disciple of Barker, awarded a split score of 7NT= for East-West and 7NT-2 for North-South, on the basis that the TD had not been called before the exchange of remarks, would you take action as Chief Tournament Director?

[WellSpyder]

I have changed my mind twice during the course of the related thread, so I don't suppose my answers help much here! Anyway, FWIW

 

(a.) probably too embarrassed to appeal, but I would certainly feel hard done by since (i) oppo were apparently happy with one down and (ii) arguably the only line compatable with the claim statement (ie conceding one off) is to lose the spade trick early - why not at trick 3, indeed?

 

(b.) definitely not

 

(c.) no aspirations to be a chief TD! But I might ask the TD whether on reflection he thought that ruling was unnecessarily harsh in the light of the requirement to be as equitable as possible to both sides

 

(d.) not sure of CTD's powers, but I would certainly expect to say to the TD that I wouldn't regard some discussion of a claim before calling a TD to be against the laws - it is hard to see how in practice defenders will decide whether or not to call the TD without some exchange of remarks.

[iviehoff]

I would rule 13 tricks. I would appeal in (a) and not appeal in (B).

 

I don't know enough about the powers of Chief Tournament Director in relation to other Tournament Directors to be sure of the legal situation for © and (d). © seems to be a legal ruling, albeit that the judgment aspect is very strained. I would be surprised if a CTD could overrule a ruling on grounds of a judgment, so I suspect he CTD can't do anything about it if there is no appeal. (d) seems to be wrong in law. If the power of CTD includes rectifying rulings that are wrong in law, then it seems to me it should be rectified. I can't think of any legal way for a claim to ruled as a split score, because adjudicating claims, including rulings under Law 71, is not about making an adjustment to rectify an irregularity. So even if you find some basis for adjusting the score treating both sides as offending, or treating both sides as non-offending, there is still no basis for splitting a claim ruling.

[bluejak]

LAW 82: RECTIFICATION OF ERRORS OF PROCEDURE

 

C. Director’s Error

 

If a ruling has been given that the Director subsequently determines to be

incorrect, and if no rectification will allow the board to be scored normally,

he shall award an adjusted score, treating both sides as non-offending for

that purpose.

If the Chief TD decides a ruling is incorrect, he would instruct the TD concerned to apply this Law. This could happen even in a judgement ruling.

 

[a] If I made this claim, no I would not appeal, I would head for the nearest pub where I would buy a drink under an assumed name.

[d] I would tell him that this is not a case where split scores apply since discussion before the TD is normal and does not affect anything and suggest he corrects his ruling.

 

:ph34r:

 

Note: putting c in round parentheses () has unintended consequences. One solution is to use square parentheses.

[RMB1]

d ) if the TD, a disciple of Barker, awarded a split score of 7NT= for East-West and 7NT-2 for North-South, on the basis that the TD had not been called before the exchange of remarks, would you take action as Chief Tournament Director?

 

I would hate to think my grumpy remarks had disciples.

 

In this case there is no requirement to call the TD by the non-offending side: they accepted the claim. This is a case of dummy attempting to withdraw a concession by declarer. There is no requirement for the TD to be summoned (immediately) in Law 71 as there is Law 68D.

 

No doublt I am missing something.

In ©, what sequence of plays allows East-West to get six tricks after the rounded winners: ♥A, ♥K, ♣A, ♣K, ♠2 ?

Did you mean declarer cashes the heart winners only: ♥A, ♥K, ♠2 ? Surely a disciple of Burn would now give the defence the rest of the tricks: cashing hearts for dummy to throw ♦A and declarer ♣AK, and then clubs for declarer to throw ♦KQJ.

[lamford]

I would hate to think my grumpy remarks had disciples.

 

In this case there is no requirement to call the TD by the non-offending side: they accepted the claim. This is a case of dummy attempting to withdraw a concession by declarer. There is no requirement for the TD to be summoned (immediately) in Law 71 as there is Law 68D.

 

No doublt I am missing something.

In ©, what sequence of plays allows East-West to get six tricks after the rounded winners: ♥A, ♥K, ♣A, ♣K, ♠2 ?

Did you mean declarer cashes the heart winners only: ♥A, ♥K, ♠2 ? Surely a disciple of Burn would now give the defence the rest of the tricks: cashing hearts for dummy to throw ♦A and declarer ♣AK, and then clubs for declarer to throw ♦KQJ.

You are right, and it should indeed be ten off. I was intending to cash three rounded winners and then exit with a spade. The defence cash one heart, on which South throws a club, and now cash four clubs, on which South throws spades, then back with a heart for West to enjoy the good spades. But that is only nine off.

[Siegmund]

The Burners and Barkers are not consistent with the claim statement. The only two lines to consider are conceding the loser immediately while you still have all 3 other suits stopped, or cashing all the winners and "conceding" the last trick.

The former leads to down 1, the latter to making. The director makes a judgment call whether the former counts as normal or not.

 

In that respect, it is indeed 'the same as' the Kx of clubs case in the other thread: there are two lines to consider and declarer believes both lines lead to the same number of tricks. But I think a director is allowed to rule differently in one than the other, if he believes the relative likelihood of the two lines being taken isn't the same.

 

Notice that in the Hogwarts hand, I DON'T consider the line of cashing all the side suits and four spades, coming down to T-5 of spades, and exiting the 5 at trick 12 to go down two. Similarly, in the other thread, if we were at trick 10 and looking at Kxxx opposite AQx, I would not judge "cash two clubs and exit the third" as a normal line. (If someone at the table - including dummy - convinced me, in the other thread, that in fact something like this had preceded the claim, I would rule contract making. As I understood the other thread, we had been messing around with other suits coming down to an end position hoping for a bad discard or a squeeze or something, and then gave up.)

[dburn]

Down ten seems reasonable. One should endeavour to encourage proper claims, and if this South thinks he can get away with down nine he should be disabused of the notion.

 

The point is that a rational "disciple of Burn" would never concede down exactly one. Instead, he would either play the hand out or make some more exact statement than "I concede down one".

 

If the Burn claim laws were universally adopted, more claimers rather than fewer would actually end up with the number of tricks God intended them to take, because no one would ever risk making a bum claim [statement].

 

As it is, there appears to exist a distinction between a bum claim statement and a bum claim. While this distinction may be fruitful for what I will call bridge theologians, it should have no practical import whatsoever.

 

Objections to Burn claim laws to the effect that "it would slow the game down" or "nobody would ever claim" are simply nonsense. All that would happen is that someone who claims would be required to elaborate on his statement by adding a few words that would take a few extra seconds. In most cases, this would require only that he conforms with the current Laws anyway, which the vast majority of claimers currently do not.

 

As long as you consider claims from the point of view of "how many tricks would the claimer have made had the hand been played out?", you are rendering all claim rulings at best subjective and at worst illegal. And as long as you stick to misguided notions of "equity", you render yourselves liable when appearing as TDs or AC members to a rousing chorus of "Who's the wanker in the black?"

[mrdct]

The Burners and Barkers are not consistent with the claim statement. The only two lines to consider are conceding the loser immediately while you still have all 3 other suits stopped, or cashing all the winners and "conceding" the last trick.

The former leads to down 1, the latter to making. The director makes a judgment call whether the former counts as normal or not.

I think there is a plausible third line to consider, bearing in mind that declarer believes this deck to contain 14 ♠s. This would be to attempt to fool the opponents into thinking that there is squeeze on and hope that both will let go of ♣. Basically cash the ♠AKQJ10, pitching two ♣s and a ♥, at which point you "know" your LHO holds the 5 1/2♠ so you cash your winners finishing in dummy and hope and pray that the ♣6 has managed to get good - which of course it hasn't. The theme being that if he doesn't know that the ♠5 is good he probably won't have much idea about whether the ♣6 is good. The lines to go down in 7NT are certainly careless and inferior but would not be considered irrational. Accordingly, I rule 7NT-1. As for the other questions:

 

a. Yes I would appeal arguing that everybody cashes their winners from the top so there is no possible way of going down. Well worth a try and I doubt I'd lose my deposit.

b. Kind of depends on what the event is, who my opponents were and how the TD rationalised his ruling. I'd probably just have a chat to an appeals advisor and only appeal if encouraged to do so.

c. Yes, that ruling is quite silly and appears to be just rubbing declarer's nose in his own ineptitude.

d. Yes.

[gordontd]

Deleted

[mfa1010]

Down 1.

 

When declarer thinks his last spade is a loser, it is 'normal play' to keep the entry to dummy as long as possible and hope for a miracle in clubs (or hearts). Ultimately the ending will be something like:

 

Dummy: ♦A, ♣x

Declarer: ♦J, ♠x.

 

Still thinking that the spade doesn't cash, he plays diamonds to dummy and concedes the last trick in clubs.

 

Declarer's claim was 12 tricks, and he has ♠AKQJT, ♥AK, ♦AKQ, ♣AK so any ruling of down more than one would be absurd.

 

If dummy had had ♦Ax instead there would be no way to cash his 12 winners without ending in hand. Therefore declarer would have got all 13 in that case. It is not 'normal play' with a suit such as AKQJTx to suddenly exit small when we are aware that the small one is a loser. So all 'normal' lines would give 13 tricks and 13 he would get.

[iviehoff]

Down 1.

 

When declarer thinks his last spade is a loser, it is 'normal play' to keep the entry to dummy as long as possible and hope for a miracle in clubs (or hearts). Ultimately the ending will be something like:

 

Dummy: ♦A, ♣x

Declarer: ♦J, ♠x.

 

Still thinking that the spade doesn't cash, he plays diamonds to dummy and concedes the last trick in clubs.

This is convincing. I've changed my mind.

[lamford]

Down 1.

 

When declarer thinks his last spade is a loser, it is 'normal play' to keep the entry to dummy as long as possible and hope for a miracle in clubs (or hearts). Ultimately the ending will be something like:

 

Dummy: ♦A, ♣x

Declarer: ♦J, ♠x.

 

Still thinking that the spade doesn't cash, he plays diamonds to dummy and concedes the last trick in clubs.

The problem with that is there can be no miracle in either clubs or hearts, as the line stated has a 0% chance of success. About the only line that offers any chance, assuming there are fourteen spades in this faulty pack, is to cash the rounded suit winners, and then the diamonds ending in dummy. A player with four clubs and six spades, including a spade from another pack, gets squeezed on this trick. Declarer concedes one down when this does not happen, but again is forced to make it, as he will cross to the spades. This line has the extra chance that the fourteenth spade should be a club, and then he only needs West to have six spades and three clubs.

 

I am actually struggling to find a "normal" line that fails. I guess the average player would cash the spades hearts and clubs and diamonds in that order ending in hand, and hope someone is as bad as counting as him, and discards the "spade".

[mfa1010]

The problem with that is there can be no miracle in either clubs or hearts, as the line stated has a 0% chance of success. About the only line that offers any chance, assuming there are fourteen spades in this faulty pack, is to cash the rounded suit winners, and then the diamonds ending in dummy. A player with four clubs and six spades, including a spade from another pack, gets squeezed on this trick. Declarer concedes one down when this does not happen, but again is forced to make it, as he will cross to the spades. This line has the extra chance that the fourteenth spade should be a club, and then he only needs West to have six spades and three clubs.

 

I am actually struggling to find a "normal" line that fails. I guess the average player would cash the spades hearts and clubs and diamonds in that order ending in hand, and hope someone is as bad as counting as him, and discards the "spade".

We don't need to consider squeezes. Declarer gave up after T2 and settled to cash out for down 1. Only if all normal lines of cashing out leads to his being in hand at T13 with last spade should we give him the contract. Normal lines includes (normal) bad lines. Playing as I stated is a normal but unsuccesful line, and we only need to find one of those to rule him down 1.

[lamford]

Playing as I stated is a normal but unsuccesful line.

The only normal line is actually to claim thirteen tricks, six spades, two hearts, three diamonds and two clubs. All these other lines are contrived and worse than careless or inferior. Declarer did not specify a line. If he had claimed one down at trick one, how would you have ruled?

[lamford]

It is not 'normal play' with a suit such as AKQJTx to suddenly exit small when we are aware that the small one is a loser.

Here I agree, and I do not accept ducking a spade at any stage other than trick thirteen as normal. If dummy had Ax of diamonds, I agree with you that the contract makes. I don't agree when dummy has Axx, but there is some validity to that argument.

[mfa1010]

The only normal line is actually to claim thirteen tricks, six spades, two hearts, three diamonds and two clubs. All these other lines are contrived and worse than careless or inferior. Declarer did not specify a line. If he had claimed one down at trick one, how would you have ruled?

Heh, it is a little unrealistic scenario. I suppose that it would quickly be revealed why declarer thought he would be down one (likely he just thought an ace was missing) and we would then give him all the tricks.

 

If declarer is stating or indicating that he is about to do something that is worse than careless or inferior he will be bound by that. Here declarer is indicating that he is not going to regard the 6th spade as a trick. Then he is bound by that.

[mrdct]

The only normal line is actually to claim thirteen tricks, six spades, two hearts, three diamonds and two clubs. All these other lines are contrived and worse than careless or inferior. Declarer did not specify a line.

Whilst declarer did not specify a line he expressed a firmly held belief that LHO was holding the same number of spades as he was, so unless he sees LHO pitch a ♠ he is going to assume the ♠5 is a loser. Accordingly, a line finishing with the ♣ loser in dummy rather than the ♠ loser in hand is perfectly consistent with declarer's concession. Giving declarer some credit, I'm sure he doesn't think there are 14 spades in the deck but has just made an additon error of either 6+6+2=13 or 6+2=7. Let he who has never made an arithmetic error at the bridge table cast the first stone.

If he had claimed one down at trick one, how would you have ruled?

If he'd claimed one down at trick one before testing spades that would be extremely odd and I'd first like to ask South what he has been smoking and why he hasn't been sharing it. But in this fairly unlikely hypothetical situation, I guess the most plausible reason for the claim is that he has tried to count his tricks, reached 12 and concluded he's one down. To reach the conclusion of only 12 tricks, he's either thought 6+2+3+2=12 or perhaps he's miscounted the spades and thinks he's got 5+2+3+2=12. In any case I think there would still exist lines predicated on confusion as to where his tricks are coming from that would see him finishing in dummy with a ♣ loser. These line would obviously be "careless or inferior" but they are rational insofar as they can be rationalised by declarer based on his evident mistaken assumptions. I rule one down.

[barmar]

The crux of the matter is that once declarer has made a statement that implies either faulty logic or faulty arithmetic, how much credit can you give him to play "rationally"? He's already indicated that he's temporarily irrational, he shouldn't be allowed to get around this because the TD is effectively playing out the hand on his behalf. This is part of the reason why the Law says that normal includes "careless or inferior" (the bigger reason is that we really want to encourage complete claim statements, so we punish you if your statement leaves room for stupid mistakes).

[lamford]

The crux of the matter is that once declarer has made a statement that implies either faulty logic or faulty arithmetic, how much credit can you give him to play "rationally"?

But the Laws require us to assume that he will play normally, even though he has already shown signs that he will not. If he had claimed his contract silently at trick two, he would have been awarded it, I think you agree. It does not seem right that a different line of play is deemed to be normal when declarer concedes one down to when he claims his contract. The class of player has not significantly changed as a result of the faulty claim, so normal play for this class of player cannot have changed.

 

If he had claimed 13 tricks at trick one or two, all these lines exiting with a low spade, or getting to dummy at trick 12 to lose a club, would be regarded as ridiculous. Now you are arguing that they have become normal for this class of player because he miscounted. I don't agree.

[mfa1010]

But the Laws require us to assume that he will play normally, even though he has already shown signs that he will not. If he had claimed his contract silently at trick two, he would have been awarded it, I think you agree. It does not seem right that a different line of play is deemed to be normal when declarer concedes one down to when he claims his contract. The class of player has not significantly changed as a result of the faulty claim, so normal play for this class of player cannot have changed.

 

If he had claimed 13 tricks at trick one or two, all these lines exiting with a low spade, or getting to dummy at trick 12 to lose a club, would be regarded as ridiculous. Now you are arguing that they have become normal for this class of player because he miscounted. I don't agree.

The principle of normal lines is only applicable when we don't have a concrete statement or evidence from the player about how he would play. It is there to fill out the missing parts.

 

If he states a line that is worse than bad or inferior and that plan leads to failure, then he is stuck with that failure. TD should not overrule his plan because the plan is too bad to be normal.

 

If a player claims where it is clear that he has forgot about a trump, TD should not evaluate if it is normal to count the trumps right and draw the last one. He should instead evaluate what lines are normal given that declarer is known to have forgot the trump.

 

Same principle in our case. TD should evaluate what lines are normal given that declarer thinks that the 6th spade is not cashing, because declarer's claim can only reasonably be understood as if he thinks that.

 

So declarer can easily be worse off in a claim situation by saying the wrong things compared to being silent. When he is being silent about the whole play or some part of it, he will at least be allowed to play normally (which can be pretty bad, though). Not so if he indicates that he is about to do something really stupid.

 

Note that it is clear from § 70 that TD is required to make a full interpretation of declarer's intentions for the remaining tricks based on what declarer says, even when the statement is fuzzy about the precise sequence of play.

[lamford]

If a player claims where it is clear that he has forgot about a trump, TD should not evaluate if it is normal to count the trumps right and draw the last one. He should instead evaluate what lines are normal given that declarer is known to have forgot the trump.

I agree, the TD decides what is normal given that he forgot about the trump. But here there are no trumps, and no stated line of play. Nothing in the Laws permits the TD to decide on how this particular declarer was going to play the hand. Indeed, the declarer is allowed to introduce an unstated line of play, such as "playing the spades from the top", if the TD decides that failure to adopt that line would be irrational. 71.2 makes it clear that declarer can withdraw his concession of one down, if a trick could not be lost by any normal play of the remaining cards. No, there is nothing in the Laws at all which require - even permit - the TD to guess how this particular declarer was going to play the hand based on any remarks he might or might not have made. The sole requirement of the TD is to establish, for this class of player, the least favourable normal line.

 

The class of player was presumably intermediate. The beginner would play out the winners and hope the long spade was good. The expert would (I hope) claim immediately. The true expert would recite, like a congregation chanting the Lord's prayer, "ace of spades, king of spades, queen of spades, jack of spades, ten of spades, spade, ace of hearts, king of diamonds, queen of diamonds, diamond to the ace, club to the king and the ace of clubs,", conforming with 68C and ideally without pausing for breath so that Mr Burn cannot give him a slow play fine. However, the normal line for the intermediate player is, as you know, I know, and everyone else knows to play out the thirteen winners in order. The normal line for some idiot that miscounts the spades could be anything, but that is not what the TD is supposed to impose. He is supposed, nay required, to give "this class of player" (not this confused player) normal play. And for every class of player, normal play does not include ridiculous lines of losing a club at trick thirteen.

 

And for the avoidance of doubt, I disagree that the principle of normal lines does not apply where there is a concrete claim statement. Where do the Laws say that? 70D1 indicates to the contrary - that clearly applies the test of normality to the statement itself. So, if declarer had stated "I will give you a spade", again that would not be a normal line, and the contract would still make! I believe the old rules had something like "in strict accordance with his statement" - but that is no longer there, so the HH and SB tussles have lost a bit as a result.

[alphatango]

Out of interest, would those advocating a ruling of one down rule differently if declarer's spade suit were AKQJT8?

[bluejak]

The true expert would recite, like a congregation chanting the Lord's prayer, "ace of spades, king of spades, queen of spades, jack of spades, ten of spades, spade, ace of hearts, king of diamonds, queen of diamonds, diamond to the ace, club to the king and the ace of clubs,", conforming with 68C and ideally without pausing for breath so that Mr Burn cannot give him a slow play fine.

The true expert would put his hand away in the board without showing it. :o

[mjj29]

The true expert would put his hand away in the board without showing it. :o

And if I'm the oppenent that will meet with the response "I accept your concession of all the tricks - 1300 to us?" (this behaviour particularly annoys me, and there's a local good player who does it. Last time he was also rather rude to me when I objected).