[lamford]

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24-board knockout match. Table result: EW 6♠X-1, NS+200

Two local players from a Brighton club have been attending the excellent Really Easy Congress here at Brighton and listening to the fine seminars in the morning. Sadly, that has made them easy prey to our friend who looks and behaves like the Secretary Bird, who has been revelling in his recent coup, and he now always asks for the whole auction to be explained before his final pass. On this hand from a match last night, West, a local player named Walter, had agreed fit jumps with his partner only the previous day, and thought he had changed his RKCB responses to 41/30, both recommended in one of the seminars. SB, South, saw little point in doubling 5♣, but when East, the club rabbit, corrected his partner's explanation of 5♣ just after South had passed out 6♠, his ears pricked up. "I refused to play that 41/30 system," said East, "and you can see that we have 30/41 on both our cards, which I printed out this morning to make sure they were identical." SB had briefly considered saving over 6♠, but actually passed, and he now called the TD, who offered him his last call back, without any strings attached, and SB chose to substitute a lightner double, asking for a club lead. He suspected that EW might be off two keycards, and his keen sense of danger alerted him to the potential layout. North dutifully led a club, and South ruffed, gaining 13 IMPs against 5♠+1 in the other room.

SB rubbed salt into the wound by stating that this was the first hand he could recall in which a lightner double had been made with a singleton ace of trumps since The Rabbit tried it unsuccessfully a few weeks ago. The director looked at the hand and did not think that South's original final pass "could well have been influenced by misinformation", as South was not entitled to know that the opponents were having a misunderstanding, and he wondered if he had made a director error. East-West's teammates were considering an appeal on this basis. How would you rule as a referee or as an AC? And would you consider a non-balancing adjusted score? Needless to say the match depends on it.

[blackshoe]

As the director, on SB's "rubbing salt": "SB, you were told yesterday that such comments are not permitted, and were given a small penalty then. 50% of a top disciplinary penalty for disregarding the TD's instructions and repeating the offense." If he argues, I'll offer him a full board penalty if he doesn't shut up.

On the rest, I'm still thinking about it.

[fbuijsen]

I feel a lot for blackshoe's line.

This is clearly a case of director error. So we assign EW a score for 6♠ made for +1430. We assign NS a score of 6♠x -1 for +200.
In addition I assign south a PP of 17 IMPs for clearly and deliberately misusing the rules to try to induce a director error.
I also ban south from my congresses for the coming 5 years.

[lamford]

fbuijsen, on 2014-August-18, 02:00, said:

In addition I assign south a PP of 17 IMPs for clearly and deliberately misusing the rules to try to induce a director error.
I also ban south from my congresses for the coming 5 years.

I do not think South did anything wrong, apart from a breach of 74A2, by making a joke about The Rabbit, and that clause uses "should" rather than "must", so a PP of 17IMPs is clearly inappropriate. And South was correct to call the TD when he discovered that there was misinformation, and quite entitled to replace his final call when given the option. I think you will trigger off whatever the Dutch equivalent is of an Appeal to the National Authority if you attempt to ban South for doing nothing at all wrong. And I think the correct ruling is again +3, +3, owing to director error, and your non-balancing adjusted score does not treat both sides as non-offenders. And you cannot give EW 100% of 6S=, as they did not make that contract and might not have done anyway. North can work out that his side may have two keycards, and they could be in danger of falling on the same trick, and could also work out why his partner would not have made a lightner double, so that would be penalising NS, also non-offenders.

[blackshoe]

lamford, on 2014-August-18, 05:44, said:

I do not think South did anything wrong, apart from a breach of 74A2, by making a joke about The Rabbit, and that clause uses "should" rather than "must", so a PP of 17IMPs is clearly inappropriate.

A PP of 17 Imps may be "clearly inappropriate", but it's not because of the difference between "should" and "must" unless you're suggesting that South should get no penalty at all - a premise with which I do not agree.

[lamford]

blackshoe, on 2014-August-18, 15:23, said:

A PP of 17 Imps may be "clearly inappropriate", but it's not because of the difference between "should" and "must" unless you're suggesting that South should get no penalty at all - a premise with which I do not agree.

I don't mind the standard minimum penalty for winding up the opponent, but I would not let it influence my ruling on the main issue on the board.

[mycroft]

I don't mind twice or three times the standard penalty for winding up novices who are known to the offender to be novices, myself - or maybe once the standard penalty for the windup, one for the HH-style gloating, and one for the deliberate attempt to induce MI (as opposed to "getting the correct information"). A trip to C&E seems appropriate, as well.

I may claim to be the SB, I may claim to prefer playing to the letter of the law, but given a choice between the new pair (and all the other new pairs we don't hear about) and *this particular* SB, I know which ones my tournament is better for having.