[shevek]

Last 2 cards. Dummy has ♦K-J
East sits over these with ♦Q-7

Declarer leads a diamond and calls for ♦K.
It's noisy (end of round) and East is a bit deaf. He (claims he) didn't hear.

Anyway, dummy pushes ♦J aside and correctly places ♦K next to her played cards.
For whatever reason, East sees ♦J and plays ♦Q.

Your ruling?

[blackshoe]

The play of the Q may not be retracted. Law 47F2.

[wank]

unless dummy put the jack of diamonds confusingly close to the area used for cards played to the trick whilst he was accessing the king.

[blackshoe]

I read what the OP said. I did not go looking for reasons he might have meant something else.

[wank]

blackshoe, on 2012-February-06, 22:51, said:

I read what the OP said. I did not go looking for reasons he might have meant something else.

so did i, in particular the part about pushing the J♦ aside. with only 2 cards in dummy, and perforce a yawning gap over most of the table, depending on the direction ('aside' being rather vague) and the magnitude of the movement it would be relatively easy for one to interpret the card being 'pushed aside' as having being played.

[blackshoe]

If you're not paying attention, maybe.

[Vampyr]

blackshoe, on 2012-February-06, 23:13, said:

If you're not paying attention, maybe.

So provided 4th hand did not watch dummy's precise movements, he can easily be confused as to which card is actually played.

[bluejak]

And so?

If a player mishears the call, does not watch dummy's actions, sees two cards and picks the wrong one as played, what do you suggest? That we call his mother to come and dry his tears?

[PeterAlan]

Playing Devil's advocate, it's not quite so straightforward. E clearly did not understand that ♦K had been played, so let's look at

Law 45 B. Play of Card from Dummy said:

Declarer plays a card from dummy by naming the card, after which dummy picks up the card and faces it on the table.

But dummy didn't pick up ♦K, dummy instead initially "picked up" ♦J (dummies often do not physically lift the card being played). So we might then look at

Law 45 D. Card Misplayed by Dummy said:

If dummy places in the played position a card that declarer did not name, the card must be withdrawn if attention is drawn to it before each side has played to the next trick, and a defender may withdraw and return to his hand a card played after the error but before attention was drawn to it; ...

"The played position" does not appear to be defined.

This seems to give the TD sufficient leeway to make a sensible, pragmatic decision in the light of the actual circumstances at the table, which inevitably can not be characterised fully in the OP but which the TD is in the best position to ascertain if (s)he is called at the time. If (s)he determines that these Laws are not appropriate then, yes, Law 47F2 would apply.

[barmar]

Wow, I didn't realize before how vague 45B is. "on the table" can be anywhere on the table, even mixed among the rest of dummy's cards. So he can simply pick it up and put it back down, and that meets his 45B obligation.

[blackshoe]

The OP says that the J was "pushed aside" and the K was "correctly placed next to [dummy's] played cards". Doesn't sound to me like much room for misinterpretation.

[wank]

blackshoe, on 2012-February-07, 12:38, said:

The OP says that the J was "pushed aside" and the K was "correctly placed next to [dummy's] played cards". Doesn't sound to me like much room for misinterpretation.

really? with only 2 cards on the table i would find it surprising that dummy needed to dig for the king at all. and 'pushed aside' sounds like a relatively big movement in terms of what's normally required to expose enough of the desired card to remove it, even in a full, compressed dummy. it sounds to me like this dummy has a fairly idiosyncratic way of handling the cards or understandably gets a little careless towards the end of the hand - urgent appointment at the bar?

obviously peteralan has the truth of it that the director would have been in a good position to investigate at the time quite how the J♦ was moved.

[barmar]

Sounds like the opponent simply jumped the gun. He eagerly expected declarer to finesse, and when he saw dummy moving the J he assumed it was being played. But unless dummy's action was really ambiguous, which it doesn't sound like it was, I don't think he gets the trick.

[PeterAlan]

barmar, on 2012-February-07, 12:52, said:

Sounds like the opponent simply jumped the gun. He eagerly expected declarer to finesse, and when he saw dummy moving the J he assumed it was being played.

In view of the wording of Law 45B he has some justification for so assuming. It sounds like you're bringing pre-conceptions to bear: where's the evidence for "He eagerly expected declarer to finesse"? This is just my point - we should approach these cases with as open a mind as possible, and start by establishing exactly what happened (and which Laws are then in point).

[blackshoe]

PeterAlan, on 2012-February-07, 17:35, said:

This is just my point - we should approach these cases with as open a mind as possible, and start by establishing exactly what happened (and which Laws are then in point).

The most useful post in this thread so far, imo. Shevek, you have anything to add to your original post?

[shevek]

blackshoe, on 2012-February-07, 17:56, said:

The most useful post in this thread so far, imo. Shevek, you have anything to add to your original post?

Not much.
East is not a top player but he is related to one. He's a cousin of George Rapee.
As you might surmise, he is not a young man.
I ruled no more tricks to EW, which bemused them. Later overheard to complain mildly about a bad ruling.

Perhaps it was. By the time I arrived at the table, the evidence had moved. It's possible that dummy's fingers edged towards ♦J, expecting a finesse. I surmise that she pushed ♦J slightly to her left before picking up ♦K and placing to her right. NS maintain they did nothing unusual.

[Vampyr]

shevek, on 2012-February-07, 22:43, said:

Not much.
East is not a top player but he is related to one. He's a cousin of George Rapee.
As you might surmise, he is not a young man.
I ruled no more tricks to EW, which bemused them. Later overheard to complain mildly about a bad ruling.

Perhaps it was. By the time I arrived at the table, the evidence had moved. It's possible that dummy's fingers edged towards ♦J, expecting a finesse. I surmise that she pushed ♦J slightly to her left before picking up ♦K and placing to her right. NS maintain they did nothing unusual.

So dummy did move both cards? I would award the trick to the opposition and be thinking about a PP for the Alcatraz Coup.

[barmar]

The way I understand it, the J was sitting on top of the K, as is normal for the layout of cards in dummy, and she was just moving it out of the way so she could pick up the K. Does that really deserve a PP?

BTW, this thread got me watching last night how I act as dummy. I don't generally "pick up" the card, I usually just slide it out of the stack. In my case the "played position" is near the edge of the table, between myself and the rest of dummy's faced cards, and adjacent to dummy's quitted tricks (quitting the trick usually just involves turning it over and pointing it in the correct direction, it's already approximately where it needs to be). I think this was the most common style, although a few players push dummy's card towards the middle of the table rather than towards themselves.

[mycroft]

What I will frequently see in this particular case is that people will push the lower, "non-played" card away from the played one, and then hold the played card.

Unfortunately, it *looks*, at least until the motion is done, like the card "moved from dummy" is the played card, because it's the one that's in a different place from before (frequently a full card's different place).

That, combined with not hearing the call, could very easily be interpreted as the low card played.

I also note that while I don't do it often, I remember doing it more than once. I shall endeavour to break that habit.

[aguahombre]

mycroft, on 2012-February-08, 12:57, said:

What I will frequently see in this particular case is that people will push the lower, "non-played" card away from the played one, and then hold the played card.

Unfortunately, it *looks*, at least until the motion is done, like the card "moved from dummy" is the played card, because it's the one that's in a different place from before (frequently a full card's different place).

That, combined with not hearing the call, could very easily be interpreted as the low card played.

I also note that while I don't do it often, I remember doing it more than once. I shall endeavour to break that habit.

And if you noticed having done that at the table, I am equally sure you would have conceded that each side gets one of the last two tricks.