Tollemache Qual 1 (EBU)

[lamford]

Why are you so reluctant to comment? We would value being able to read your views on Laws & Rulings more often.

Indeed. The County director course conducted by mamos and others was very stimulating.

[bluejak]

It is interesting that several people have found some people who think the explanation ambiguous, and yet there seems a very strong view that it should not be ambiguous.

 

The problem with casual explanations is that they will get misunderstood. That does not mean they should be misunderstood: it does not mean it is reasonable that they are misunderstood.

 

But it seems to me that if N/S play an agreement and explain it casually in a way which their opponents may misunderstand, whether reasonable or not, then N/S are at fault when they could have made the agreement completely clear.

 

One or two comments make it sound as though I would expect to have been misled myself and then they suggest I should not. Of course I would not have been misled because I would have asked the meaning of 4♥ but that is of no importance whatever. What is important is that a casual explanation was given and the actual E/W pair was misled. That is misinformation.

 

I think too many people seem to think that if they would not have been misled then it is not MI. Wrong: it is whether the pair at the table was misled: if they were then it was MI.

[dburn]

Did you mean to use the plural of "advantage"? The L&EC minutes did not record why the decision was taken to stop alerting over 3NT. I presume that the rationale was to reduce UI to the bidding side when it has had a misunderstanding (I cannot think of any other advantages, but maybe Gordon or Jeremy can enlighten us). However, this unfortunate practice can give (different) problems to their opponents. If the rules cannot protect both sides, why should they favour the side that does not know its own methods?

"Permit me, as an old Equity draftsman, to make a suggestion." (W S Gilbert, Iolanthe)

 

The EBU L&EC has for a number of years (and I think I may be the only person who has served on it for all of them) vacillated on the question of whether or not players should alert above 3NT. On the one hand it is held that such alerts help only the side that is making bids above 3NT (4♣ being Gerber when alerted and something else when not alerted being the canonical example). On the other hand, as happened only this evening, it may be important for the opponents to know what 4♦ (good 4♠ opening) - pass - 4♥ (some slam interest, at least three controls) means, but in the present jurisdiction we are not allowed to tell them unless they ask, thereby possibly conveying UI to partner.

 

Thus, the rationale is not to "reduce UI to the bidding side when it has had a misunderstanding"; rather, it is to eliminate the possibility that the bidding side will avoid a misunderstanding by means of tempestive (look it up) alerts. To that extent the policy is laudable; to the extent that is prevents the non-bidding side from finding out what it needs to know, it is not.

 

Of course, the whole muddle in the current case would have been avoided if the 4♣ bidder had been allowed to alert 4♥ as showing spades. But he wasn't, so he didn't. Perhaps gnasher would have done anyway; for myself I would consider it automatic to alert were it not for the fact that I know I'm not supposed to. In truth, if my partner had explained 4♣ as "asks me to transfer to my major" and then bid 4♥, I could not bear to sit there smugly waiting for the guy on my right to bid spades on such as ♠Axx, so I would commit some histrionic to ensure that he did not - or at least that if he did, his partner would know it was a cue-bid. In all seriousness, what harm could I do thereby?

 

The purpose of any mechanism to ensure full disclosure as required by the Laws should be just that: to ensure full disclosure as required by the Laws. Insofar as it fails in this purpose, it is a bad mechanism, and in that respect not alerting above 3NT may in many cases be a bad mechanism. To my way of thinking, players understand now far better than they did ten years ago what their responsibilities are in respect of UI, and we don't need a mechanism to prevent them from exchanging it if that mechanism prevents full and timely disclosure. But I could very well be wrong.

 

This has not much to do with the present case - I don't understand why East bid 4♠ anyway, and I would want convincing that he wouldn't have done if he'd been told that 4♥ showed spades. But if the AC thought categorically that he was told that (because to the AC "transfer to my major" had no meaning other than "4♥ shows spades"), then the AC may have been a distance adrift best measured in anything from miles to parsecs. In this respect I find myself (not for the first time) entirely in agreement with my learned brother bluejak.

[EricK]

It took a bit of research, but:

FLINT CONVENTION

... this convention enables the responder to a 2NT opening to halt the bidding in three of a major suit. The first step is to respond 3♦, directing the opener to bid 3♥...

976542 43 107 J64

Over the forced rebid of 3♥, responder will transfer to 3♠...

 

Reese & Dormer, Bridge Player's Alphabetical Handbook, 1981

It seems to be a peculiarity of Reese. In "The Mistakes you Make at Bridge" by Reese and Trezel, there is a hand where the commentary says something like "North opens 3♣ after which South transfers to 3NT" and he clearly means the bidding simply went 3♣ 3NT. I don't think I have heard anybody else use it in quite this way. Of course that's not to say that some people won't understand it this way if presented in an ambiguous setting. Clearly EW did on the given hand, and my father did when I gave him the auction and explanation - although I personally didn't see the ambiguity (and understood it how NS intended) until I had read the thread.

[alphatango]

FWIW, I polled 5 pairs at my most recent duplicate who finished their rounds early at various points in the evening (field size = 13). Average club duplicate, quality not high. None played a multi 2♦ opening (methods were split between three weak twos, and strong 2♣+strong 2♦+weak 2s in the majors). I offered the auction 2♦-(Pass)-4♣-Pass-4♥ (modified from the OP), and explained that 2♦ showed a weak two in either hearts or spades. I did not volunteer an explanation of 4♣.

 

Me: "What do I have?"

 

Four of the five pairs asked what 4♣ showed. (One pair did not ask about the 4♣ bid, and responded "Hearts, no club support.")

 

Me: "It asks me to transfer to my major."

 

All four pairs then said that I should have a weak two in spades.