[shevek]

So I'm running a congress Swiss teams in Sydney. Gave a ruling iin Round 4. A pair appealed and are now playing round 5 (9 bds).
It would be good to get back to them. Anyway, here goes:

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EW play Namyats, alerted. It's on their card.
They claim that East has not forgotten previously.

West "took a view"

A ruled correct info, no infraction so -500 to NS.

NS appealed, believing West wasn't allowed to bid like that.

[blackshoe]

Did East show any reaction, however slight, when West alerted 4♦?

[Bbradley62]

And no one can report that East gasped, or rolled his eyes, or groaned, or in some other way clued in West?

[barmar]

It looks like West made his decision by looking at his hand; one or two of his top 3 spades should probably be in his partner's hand for him to have a correct 4♦ bid. So it seemed more likely that his partner forgot. Unless there's a history of such forgetfulness, there's no implicit agreement that needs to be disclosed.

And I don't see how the possible MI caused the damage. Pulling partner's double looks like a serious error to me, and I don't think it's related to the infraction (if we were to rule that there was MI). With the information they were given, there's no reason to expect the opponents have a diamond fit. In fact, even though they do, they're going for an international number.

I vote result stands.

[shevek]

Thanks all.

No assertion that East conveyed UI when partner alerted.

[sfi]

Didn't North just give up 1400 for no reason at all? Pulling the penalty double does not appear to be suggested by the explanation (either the one that describes their agreement or their hand).

In any case, if West has no UI then they are free to do what they like. I believe there is even a specific clause in the alert regulations that states that tendency to forget is not to be part of the explanation.

Table result stands.

[hrothgar]

sfi, on 2014-February-16, 00:11, said:

Didn't North just give up 1400 for no reason at all? Pulling the penalty double does not appear to be suggested by the explanation (either the one that describes their agreement or their hand).

In any case, if West has no UI then they are free to do what they like. I believe there is even a specific clause in the alert regulations that states that tendency to forget is not to be part of the explanation.

Table result stands.

I agree that the result should stand.

North can't be sure that that the Naymats 4♦ was bid by mistake.
With this said and done, South is known to have a hand that is willing to sign off in 4♥.
I don't think that the decision to pull the penalty double was caused by the infraction. It was simply a poor decision.

One interesting question that hasn't been raised:

Absent the pass of 4♦, the 5♦ bid would be a lead directing raise to 5♠.