[keledor]

Playing at a local club last night, we had the situation where Declarer creates a very likely throw-in to make a contract. Declarer strips the other suits and intends to force RHO to either cash A♠ or give a ruff-sluff holding declarer to 2 tricks.
RHO has AQ♠ sitting over Dummys Kx

To beat it RHO has to duck AKx in their suit to partners queen when the suit is singleton in dummy & declarers hand - the player is highly unlikely to do so.

The preceding trick to the throw-in RHO plays a club (the throw-in suit) and immediately prevents their revoke by correcting to a Heart the played suit.

The club becomes a major penalty card and now RHO has to duck his AK♣and so beat the contract.

What law allows an adjusted score?

Steve

[Cyberyeti]

keledor, on 2011-February-23, 04:16, said:

Playing at a local club last night, we had the situation where Declarer creates a very likely throw-in to make a contract. Declarer strips the other suits and intends to force RHO to either cash A♠ or give a ruff-sluff holding declarer to 2 tricks.
RHO has AQ♠ sitting over Dummys Kx

To beat it RHO has to duck AKx in their suit to partners queen when the suit is singleton in dummy & declarers hand - the player is highly unlikely to do so.

The preceding trick to the throw-in RHO plays a club (the throw-in suit) and immediately prevents their revoke by correcting to a Heart the played suit.

The club becomes a major penalty card and now RHO has to duck his AK♣and so beat the contract.

What law allows an adjusted score?

Steve

I don't believe you can restore justice here UNLESS you think the revoke was done deliberately (unlikely in this case, he could simply have ducked the next trick if he saw the situation for what it was), this is just luck of the draw.

I'm reminded of a case under rather different laws from many years ago where in 4♠, the wrong defender leads Q♥ face up. At the time, declarer is allowed to call for the lead of any given suit, so picks an advantageous one (clubs), at which point LHO announces he has none of that suit. The Q♥ is picked up, so LHO leads a small heart from AKxxx, his partner wins with the J, club ruff, heart to Q, club ruff, one off no restitution.

[RMB1]

keledor, on 2011-February-23, 04:16, said:

What law allows an adjusted score?

None.

If I read this correctly, the only winning line for a defender is to play a small club from AKx; but on the previous trick he revokes by playing a small club, the revoke is corrected and the small club is a major penalty card, which the defender must play to the crucial trick.

The law has been correctly applied, so there is no further rectification. There has been no damage from the point before the revoke: the defender has just forced himself to do the right thing.

One might look at Law 23:

Quote

Whenever, in the opinion of the Director, an offender could have been aware at the time of his irregularity that this could well damage the non-offending side, ...

But this can hardly apply: if defender knew it was to his advantage to have a small club as a major penalty card then he knew he had to play a small club on the crucial trick, so there was no point in the irregularity.

[Hanoi5]

Go to a witch and get a talisman. Then it won't happen again. As for this case, you're... done.

[helene_t]

declarer could condone the penalty card, couldn't he?

As for Cyberyeti's story: the information that the player who lead out of turn doesn't have any clubs: is that authorized information to his partner?

[Fluffy]

Love cyberyeti's story

As for the case, nobody said so yet, but if declarer has enough trumps he can just cash one forcing to discard the penalty card, since RHO has still 5 cards left, he probably is able to play a trump unless his trumps are exactly 3-1 at this point.

[campboy]

Much like if a defender accidentally plays the right card while intending to play the wrong one, you have no recourse.

helene_t, on 2011-February-23, 05:02, said:

declarer could condone the penalty card, couldn't he?

Law 10A says that a player may not waive any rectification on his own initiative.

If this were a Mollo story, the Hog would say "don't worry about the penalty card" (perhaps having to remind the Secretary Bird that dummy should be seen and not heard) and the Rabbit would realise that this was suspicious and play it anyway.

[helene_t]

Fluffy, on 2011-February-23, 05:17, said:

Love cyberyeti's story

As for the case, nobody said so yet, but if declarer has enough trumps he can just cash one forcing to discard the penalty card, since RHO has still 5 cards left, he probably is able to play a trump unless his trumps are exactly 3-1 at this point.

No, declarer can't play trumps as LHO will win with the queen. He needs to force LHO to play trumps from AQ.

[campboy]

helene_t, on 2011-February-23, 05:02, said:

As for Cyberyeti's story: the information that the player who lead out of turn doesn't have any clubs: is that authorized information to his partner?

I think it is (law 16A3). However, the fact that the other player has the ♥Q is not authorised for his partner (law 50E2), so I don't think the low heart lead is legal.

[mycroft]

To the OP: the appropriate Laws are 10C4 and 12B2. Unfortunately for declarer, they not only do not allow an adjusted score, the prohibit one. RR strikes again, as others have mentioned.

[Echognome]

All of the discussion surrounds an unintentional revoke. I presume there are laws to deal with an intentional revoke made to get partner to do the right thing.

[Bbradley62]

Echognome, on 2011-February-23, 18:04, said:

All of the discussion surrounds an unintentional revoke. I presume there are laws to deal with an intentional revoke made to get partner to do the right thing.

This would be relevant if the club-throw-in lead were coming from declarer, and LHO needed to play second-hand high to set the contract. However, it appears from the narrative that the club lead is coming from dummy, and LHO just has to figure out to take the trick in fourth seat, which isn't affected by the penalty card.

[TylerE]

I don't get it. If RHO knows the situation well enough, why doesn't he just not revoke and lead a small club?

[blackshoe]

TylerE, on 2011-February-23, 19:00, said:

why doesn't he just not revoke

Seriously?

[Vampyr]

campboy, on 2011-February-23, 05:24, said:

If this were a Mollo story, the Hog would say "don't worry about the penalty card" (perhaps having to remind the Secretary Bird that dummy should be seen and not heard) and the Rabbit would realise that this was suspicious and play it anyway.

Indeed, when I read the OP I thought of asking whether the defender showed a particular weakness for chocolate biscuits.

[bluejak]

Almond?

[Gerben42]

About cyberyeti's story:

Quote

I'm reminded of a case under rather different laws from many years ago where in 4♠, the wrong defender leads Q♥ face up. At the time, declarer is allowed to call for the lead of any given suit, so picks an advantageous one (clubs), at which point LHO announces he has none of that suit. The Q♥ is picked up, so LHO leads a small heart from AKxxx, his partner wins with the J, club ruff, heart to Q, club ruff, one off no restitution.

Quote

As for Cyberyeti's story: the information that the player who lead out of turn doesn't have any clubs: is that authorized information to his partner?

The fact that RHO holds ♥Q is UI - so I would probably disallow the lead of a small ♥ from AKxxx. Unfortunately, most directors forget to tell this part so then you have to give a score which is the best of both worlds...

[RMB1]

Gerben42, on 2011-February-24, 13:43, said:

The fact that RHO holds ♥Q is UI - so I would probably disallow the lead of a small ♥ from AKxxx. Unfortunately, most directors forget to tell this part so then you have to give a score which is the best of both worlds...

Cyberyeti said his story was from some time ago. The explicit statement that information from penalty cards is unauthorised (Law 50E2) is new to the current law book and before 2007 it was not clear whether (having complied with the penalty card penalties) the defenders were free to use the information from the lead out of turn.