[lamford]

---

You and your partner are both in the top ten in the world and it is a major event. What would you lead? I shall give dummy and the second part of the problem in due course. If you know the hand, please comment but not as though you know the hand!

[MrAce]

I know the hand from BW
♣ A

I assume 2♦ was hearts. Declarer can ruff ♦ A. This is how I would think if I did not know the hand. Idk maybe I am trying too hard to not to be biased.

[lamford]

MrAce, on 2015-June-12, 11:02, said:

I know the hand from BW
♣ A

I assume 2♦ was hearts. Declarer can ruff ♦ A. This is how I would think if I did not know the hand. Idk maybe I am trying too hard to not to be biased.

Interesting; there is no note on BBO as to 2♦, so it may well have shown hearts. I would expect declarer to be void of clubs rather than diamonds. But it is hard to consider what he might have when one knows the hand.

[MrAce]

lamford, on 2015-June-12, 11:14, said:

Interesting; there is no note on BBO as to 2♦, so it may well have shown hearts. I would expect declarer to be void of clubs rather than diamonds. But it is hard to consider what he might have when one knows the hand.

The problem is, when he is void in clubs i do not lose much by cashing ♣ A. but if he is void in ♦, cashing A will be disaster. And only time ♦ A wins is to find pd with ♦ stiff or void. Lack of lightner double narrows it pretty much down to singleton ♦. Perhaps we should go for it and play pd for stiff ♦, it is actually not unreasonable. E showed hearts, W did not cooperate with hearts. Even if E has 7 hearts, pd looks like holding 3 of them + 6+ clubs. He may have 3316 or 2317. But then again i am not sure if this is because i am biased or not. Trying to be fair but it is really tough when knowing the hand.

[wank]

i didn't know the hand until i saw this and read up about it. i went for the ace of diamonds, 'knowing' declarer had a club void, and hoping declarer has some kind of diamond fit and i could give partner a ruff. i can understand getting tunnel vision and not processing that dummy's only got 2 clubs, but i don't claim to have the concentration skills necessary to be in one of the best pairs in the world.

[lamford]

wank, on 2015-June-12, 18:04, said:

i didn't know the hand until i saw this and read up about it. i went for the ace of diamonds, 'knowing' declarer had a club void, and hoping declarer has some kind of diamond fit and i could give partner a ruff. i can understand getting tunnel vision and not processing that dummy's only got 2 clubs, but i don't claim to have the concentration skills necessary to be in one of the best pairs in the world.

Indeed. I would also have tried the ace of diamonds, expecting the 6H bid to be based on a club void and a secondary diamond fit. When dummy hits with ♠AKTx ♥xx ♦KJxxx ♣xx, and regardless of which cards declarer and partner play, I still have to decide on whether declarer has Qxx AKQJxxxx Qx none, which would give partner xx xx x KQJxxxxx or whether declarer has Qx AKQJxxxx x Kx which would give partner xxx xx Qx QJxxxx. While I would expect partner to bid more clubs than 2 on the first hand, I would not expect him to bid at all on the second hand. The other point is that I would not expect declarer to leap to 6H on either hand, but the one with the club void is more likely. Partner's actual hand of xxx xxx x QJxxxx would certainly have been a shock to me.

I can scarcely believe that someone who selected the diamond ace and continuation would be "referred to the Federal Public Prosecutor Office" suggesting the player received UI. David Ewart thinks the article in New in Bridge is a spoof, but it was not written in a "spoofish" manner.

[MrAce]

lamford, on 2015-June-13, 08:10, said:

Indeed. I would also have tried the ace of diamonds, expecting the 6H bid to be based on a club void and a secondary diamond fit. When dummy hits with ♠AKTx ♥xx ♦KJxxx ♣xx, and regardless of which cards declarer and partner play, I still have to decide on whether declarer has Qxx AKQJxxxx Qx none, which would give partner xx xx x KQJxxxxx or whether declarer has Qx AKQJxxxx x Kx which would give partner xxx xx Qx QJxxxx. While I would expect partner to bid more clubs than 2 on the first hand, I would not expect him to bid at all on the second hand. The other point is that I would not expect declarer to leap to 6H on either hand, but the one with the club void is more likely. Partner's actual hand of xxx xxx x QJxxxx would certainly have been a shock to me.

I can scarcely believe that someone who selected the diamond ace and continuation would be "referred to the Federal Public Prosecutor Office" suggesting the player received UI. David Ewart thinks the article in New in Bridge is a spoof, but it was not written in a "spoofish" manner.

There is nothing wrong about that guy who submitted it. You may believe that ♦ continuation is reasonable but it is not. If it was not Nunes, you would probably shoot the guy from table in thinking that he cheats if it was played in BBO. Nunes accepts and says "it was mental blackout" and continues "as consequences of my black out I was incapable of thinking properly"

And I believe him and I think he is honest. It just shows he is a human and not a robot. 1 hand does not really mean anything. However if this or similar hands are not reported or complained (idk the rules in Italy), there will never be any records of such strange behaviours. It is also the price of being famous, being #1 pair in the world. When a celebrity does something unexpected, people like to hear it or read it or like to see the pictures or video of it. As long as the story is factual and not fictional, I do not see how it can be a spoof.

But I agree with you that the lead itself is very normal. Issue is the continuation.

[lamford]

MrAce, on 2015-June-13, 09:59, said:

You may believe that ♦ continuation is reasonable but it is not.

For one to find "use of UI", the diamond continuation would have to be ridiculous and only to be explained by UI. I have tried a couple of strong players who think the diamond continuation is correct, even if one stops to think. The chance of East jumping to 6H missing three aces but without a void is tiny; and he did not use RKCB. Partner may well "walk the dog" at these colours with eight clubs. It is irrelevant that Nunes admits to playing on auto-pilot.

“Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.”

[MrAce]

lamford, on 2015-June-16, 06:58, said:

For one to find "use of UI", the diamond continuation would have to be ridiculous and only to be explained by UI. I have tried a couple of strong players who think the diamond continuation is correct, even if one stops to think. The chance of East jumping to 6H missing three aces but without a void is tiny; and he did not use RKCB. Partner may well "walk the dog" at these colours with eight clubs. It is irrelevant that Nunes admits to playing on auto-pilot.

"Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth."

Where did you find players at the level of Nunes who himself admitted that it was due to black out? You are native English speaker and I am not. But to my understanding this means "It was so absurd that it can only be explained by mental black out"

In fact one of the world's best players told in BW that the chance of Nunes having a black out is slim. The chance of him having his rare black out when holding 2 aces and defending slam is zero up to him. Impossible is that his pd can hold KQJT 8 times club. Even Dano and Benito, as being the jurors, could not make a statement to defend the diamond continuation. Kit Woolsey did his best to give benefit of doubt and explained it as auto-piloting but even he said "chances of pd holding KQJ 8 times club is virtually impossible"

You asked to strong players huh? The names I provided, are they strong enough compared to the ones you asked? If you dismiss them for some reason, how about Lauria as a strong player? "Something Happened"

http://neapolitanclu...g-happened.html

And here is the verdict, it could not say they are innocent but not found enough evidence.

http://newinbridge.c...i-fantunes-case

[MrAce]

I personally posted and still think that this incident itself is not an indicator to anything to the person at my level, despite much stronger players seems to be harsh on the #1 pair. I started to feel like this is not the only incident and/or there is much more to it than what the public knows. Because just like you, I was surprised that #1 pair in the world did not receive too much support from their colleagues. For example if this was done by Alfredo or Meckstroth, I am sure they will be supported by their colleagues. I have a feeling, which may be wrong of course that what we know or guess may not be the same with what top level players know or think about each other.

[cherdano]

Yeah, the comments by Hampson, Welland and Versace are all quite striking. Not sure you can accuse someone more directly of cheating without explicitly saying so than Versace ("Then something happened".) Hard to imagine any of them reacting as they did unless they had already suspected them of cheating.

I'd have been curious if North's tempo at trick one seemed unusual to anyone.

[lamford]

cherdano, on 2015-June-17, 02:05, said:

Hard to imagine any of them reacting as they did unless they had already suspected them of cheating.

There may indeed have been other hands which raised suspicion; they should be published by the accusers. There is a saying "there is no smoke without fire", but it is always better to present several hands, as happened with the German doctors and as happened with a Welsh player who "substituted his own cards for those provided by the organisers". It is human nature to accuse players better than oneself of cheating. In some cases, as with Lance Armstrong, Tyson Gay and Asafa Powell, the accusations are proved correct.

Lotan Fisher is fully aware that others accuse him of cheating. He comments on hands on his blog where people have almost directly accused him of making a bid that can only be explained by UI, and he gives other hands where his "wild" actions rebounded. My personal view is that there is no evidence against him whatsoever, but I can only go on what I have seen.

However, I do think it is quite likely that there is substantial cheating at high-level bridge, and I think every effort should be made to stamp it out. I know for certain that there is in other mind games such as chess and poker. The right method of dealing with it is, as was done here, via the ethics committees of the national federation or the WBF, but it would be much better to have more than one hand. I think that the decision in this case was correct, on the balance of probabilities, although I bow to the opinions of the experts who think it is impossible for North to have eight clubs and that is impossible for South not to consider this when continuing with a second diamond.

[mikeh]

I didn't know about the hand until just now. My understanding is that there has long been tension in Italy between fantunes and the other top Italian players. How much of that is jealousy or personalities is impossible for any outsider to say.

I am with Timo in rejecting the idea that one can infer cheating from one bizarre play. Nobody is a robot, and it is a common human error to fail to switch gears after coming to a difficult decision and then seeing something that should make one rethink. Here, the diamond lead was normal, and made with the expectation that the only plausible way to defeat the contract was to give partner a ruff. Dummy's appearance ought to have caused a rethink.

If faced with this as the only example of an apparently bizarre play working, I would tentatively prefer to think of this as a loss of focus under great pressure, and as proof that even the world's best can make silly mistakes.

As for comments by other top pros, I don't doubt their bridge prowess or logic, but I wonder whether they may be influenced by the belief that they would 'never' get this wrong, and that therefore human failing cannot be the explanation, IMO, human failing should always be considered as possible.

If these guys are cheating, they've presumably been doing it for a long time and we'd probably have more than one weird but successful defence to analyze. I remember Katz and Cohen. The BW articles about events they won were replete with comments about their opening leads, long before they got caught. I don't recall seeing any similar weird stuff with fantunes, and the top players are seen in action far more than 20 (or 40) years ago, due to vugraph.

Of course, one cannot rule out cheating, but remember that another very common human failing is to enjoy thinking bad thoughts about others, especially those who are successful.

[jdonn]

Strictly as a bridge problem I think the ace of diamonds lead is completely automatic.

[lamford]

jdonn, on 2015-June-17, 11:29, said:

Strictly as a bridge problem I think the ace of diamonds lead is completely automatic.

I think that was accepted by the jury, from my translation of the Italian and conversation with the Vugraph operator. The opening lead took about 10 seconds and the diamond continuation about two seconds. Do you think that cashing the ace of clubs at trick two is automatic and what hand, which did not use RKCB, and which is missing the ace and king of spades, are you playing declarer for? Let us say that one of the top two players in the world had bid 6H in a Bermuda Bowl final. How would you defend?

[MrAce]

mikeh, on 2015-June-17, 07:31, said:

I didn't know about the hand until just now. My understanding is that there has long been tension in Italy between fantunes and the other top Italian players. How much of that is jealousy or personalities is impossible for any outsider to say.

I thought about that too. Then I asked myself, maybe the tension between them and not willing to play in same team had different reasons than just Nunes not being a social person during the international matches.
And then I also asked myself "What about Geoff? Sabine? Welland? Garozzo and Dano? They do not have any tension with those guys. All I know is Fantunes is one of the most friendly pair in the world.

Mike, Geoff Hampson in BW said " would you really suggest that this allegation is based on 1 hand? I find that willfully obtuse."

And when an other poster asked him " Are you implying that there is a history of suspicious behaviour by Fantoni-Nunes?" Geoff did not answer the question. He did not say "No i do not mean that". I know he did not confirm it either but you know the point I am trying to make...

And he also says " All players have blackouts, it is a guarantee in bridge. It follows that the 2nd ranked player in the world has blackouts. For the 2nd ranked player in the world to have one of these blackouts when defending a slam with 2 aces on lead is nearly impossible." Which is also shared by Dano-Benito-Lauria from my understanding.


All of this, rightly or wrongly, makes me think that at the top level there have been an ongoing suspicion about this pair and it is not about just one hand.


Fantunes is known with their ruthless defense. They are famous for it. However, after this incident, and from some of the implies in BW, I gathered that some top players think their most effective part of the game (defense) starts after the screen aperture is opened. And from another reply I gathered that some of the declarer plays made are no match to their skills in defense.

http://www.district9...4_09/page24.htm

Shortly I am surprised with the entire thing. All I know is it looks like the top level bridge players, very famous ones, seem to having hard time to give benefit of doubt to this pair. What I don't know is whether this is due to past behaviours or due to too much money being on stake and they are being paranoid.

[diana_eva]

This is the verdict published on the FIGB site:
http://www.federbrid...oni%20Nunes.pdf

My Italian is very basic, but it seems to me Garozzo was polled and believed Nunes' explanation. Not sure where was said that he didn't.

Here's the relevant quote:

Quote

A fronte di tali tutele, questo Giudice ha ritenuto di eseguire un sommario
approfondimento, appurando che fenomeni comportamentali simili a quello
descritto dal Nunes (con acutezza, ed indiscutibile esperienza, sintetizzati
nel parere pervenuto, a difesa, da Benito Garozzo, e indicati come causa di
molti errori di controgioco) sono invero comunemente riconosciuti in
psicologia e nella letteratura specifica, ove assumono anche il nome di
“chiusura (o, in forma minore, difficoltà) cognitiva” per la quale il cervello,
che ha “bisogno di certezze”, e di “stabilità”, si rifiuta di accettare nuovi dati a
fronte di un già formato convincimento, così maturando delle decisioni c.d.
“copione...limitanti la flessibilità nella soluzione dei problemi... decisioni di
solito prese quando il soggetto è sotto pressione” ( ultimo corsivo estratto
da articolo di Richard G. Estake).
Situazioni di stress, stanchezza, deconcentrazione anche momentanee, che
possono ben attagliarsi al caso in esame, e dalle quali nessuno - neppure un
giocatore di assoluto valore mondiale - è esente

So I understand that as the judge quickly polled peers to figure out whether it is possible from a psychological point of view for a player of Nunes' caliber to have such a blackout, and Garozzo thought that yes, it's possible. Maybe an Italian speaker can clear that up, the wording is so convoluted that I might have understood it completely backwards.

[mikeh]

MrAce, on 2015-June-17, 13:46, said:

I thought about that too. Then I asked myself, maybe the tension between them and not willing to play in same team had different reasons than just Nunes not being a social person during the international matches.
And then I also asked myself "What about Geoff? Sabine? Welland? Garozzo and Dano? They do not have any tension with those guys. All I know is Fantunes is one of the most friendly pair in the world.

Mike, Geoff Hampson in BW said " would you really suggest that this allegation is based on 1 hand? I find that willfully obtuse."

And when an other poster asked him " Are you implying that there is a history of suspicious behaviour by Fantoni-Nunes?" Geoff did not answer the question. He did not say "No i do not mean that". I know he did not confirm it either but you know the point I am trying to make...

And he also says " All players have blackouts, it is a guarantee in bridge. It follows that the 2nd ranked player in the world has blackouts. For the 2nd ranked player in the world to have one of these blackouts when defending a slam with 2 aces on lead is nearly impossible." Which is also shared by Dano-Benito-Lauria from my understanding.


All of this, rightly or wrongly, makes me think that at the top level there have been an ongoing suspicion about this pair and it is not about just one hand.


Fantunes is known with their ruthless defense. They are famous for it. However, after this incident, and from some of the implies in BW, I gathered that some top players think their most effective part of the game (defense) starts after the screen aperture is opened. And from another reply I gathered that some of the declarer plays made are no match to their skills in defense.

http://www.district9...4_09/page24.htm

Shortly I am surprised with the entire thing. All I know is it looks like the top level bridge players, very famous ones, seem to having hard time to give benefit of doubt to this pair. What I don't know is whether this is due to past behaviours or due to too much money being on stake and they are being paranoid.

I don't think it possible to overstate how ugly it is for anyone, especially someone who plays at the highest level, to publicly level suggestions of cheating against other players. I don't give a damn about how honestly the suspicion is held.

If one is a WC player and has concern that a pair against whom one plays with some frequency is cheating, there are steps one takes to investigate. Those steps absolutely do not include making statement for publication from which a reader will logically infer that you believe the pair in question to be cheating. It is made even worse when one, despite being invited, refuses to provide any further basis for the accusation than the one hand that is being presented to one for comment.

I have no idea what Hampson, Welland, de Falco and others really said or how the comments were extracted from them so my comments should not be taken as applying to them. For all I know, they were misquoted or quoted out of context or caught offguard, or thought they were expressing opinions in confidence.

I hold no brief for Fantunes, and they certainly don't need my support. For all I know, we may read a year or so from now that a detailed investigation has revealed that they have some as-yet unknown method of illegally conveying information on defence. But until then it is harmful to the game to encourage cowardly public assassination by innuendo.

Anyone who has played thousands of hands in high-level competition is likely to hold hands on which, in hindsight, he made a blunder. Wasn't it one of Meckwell who was on lead against a doubled slam, with two Aces, each of which was known, on the auction, to be cashing? He led a side suit, hoping to score multiple undertricks, and declarer, with a hidden side suit, was able to jilt his losers and make the contract. That was a huge bridge blunder, but nobody would think of basing an allegation of cheating on that. Why? Because it didn't work out.

So Nunes makes a blunder of approximately equal magnitude, and got lucky, and all of a sudden we see that as proof of cheating?

I find this entire thread to be faintly nausea inducing. Want to call someone a cheat? Get the evidence and have a hearing. Until then everybody should just shut the F up.

Edit: I just re-read this and realize that my closing sentence could be read as a criticism of people who have posted here, and that wasn't the least bit my intention, no matter how it reads! It was an expression of how people who harbour suspicions that their peers cheat should act, not how others in the community should discuss the issues once the rumours have been propagated. In particular, I was absolutely not telling Timo to shut the F up

[MrAce]

Nobody said they are cheating, Mike.


Most of the people complained about the lack of a central recording system and that without it every incident like this will be seen as an isolated one. And you are talking as if going through the correct steps of investigation pays off.

It took forever for the bridge world to catch coughing doctors. Even after the videos and audio records and even with such a simple and stupid method, we have people who believes that their guilt was not proved. There are 2 effective ways to fight cheating

1- To be able to catch them effectively.
2- Make player play in an environment that is cheat proof.

I do not know what everyone thinks but I started to believe what Hrothgar says which is basically at the top level where huge money is involved, the #1 method can not be performed effectively. #2 is much easier to achieve.

Regardless though, I agree with you that it is ugly to make such ambiguous remarks in public without providing any other incident that justifies it. But I am not the one who is making it. I am just one of too many people who had the impression that there is more to it than just 1 this incident. I mean put yourself in shoes of public. There are very top players, who are very smart and also know damn well that making such remarks in public is ugly and can easily put them in trouble or at least make themselves look bad in public. But they still prefered to do it for whatever reason. It is normal to think that there is more to it than we know, whether it is true or not is beyond our knowledge of course.

[MrAce]

I have to make a correction.

Benito Garozzo was consultant of defense in this investigation and commented in favour of Nunes, not against, along with other defense consultants whose names are not written. Judge had his own consultants and those were the ones who did not seem to buy the "mental blackout" excuse. And judge based his decision on "lack of evidence of UI"