[lamford]

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Matchpoints, Table Result 4S? Lead K♥
This was another board which caused much unpleasantness at a North London club this week. West led a low heart against the spade game, East playing the ace and returning one, and West continued with a third heart. HH, South, ruffed high, drew trumps and played the ace and queen of clubs. West won and while he was thinking, HH claimed, telling West "Choose your poison". and showing his hand.

SB, West, replied, "I will, and I think that exiting with the queen of diamonds now beats the contract", he replied. "'Choose your poison' did not make it clear how you intended to play the hand", he continued. He quoted verbatim:
"Law 73E1 states: 1. The Director shall not accept from claimer any unstated line of play the success of which depends upon finding one opponent rather than the other with a particular card, unless an opponent failed to follow to the suit of that card before the claim was made, or would subsequently fail to follow to that suit on any normal ..."

He paused for breath not used to having to recite this long law that often, as players at the North London club were loath to claim against the pernickety SB.

"... line of play, or unless failure to adopt that line of play would be irrational. And there is a footnote," he continued, "which, I submit, makes it clear that declarer cannot now win with the ace and finesse the ten, as that was an unstated line of play, and to win with the king and finesse the nine, while being only half as good because of the principle of restricted choice, is still a normal line of play which would be adopted by many a player. And your claim was not valid anyway as East could have had QJ of diamonds even though that would have only given me an eight-count. Anyway let us leave it to the TD." "DIRECTOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOR", he bellowed, pleased to try to take HH down a peg or two.

How do you rule?

[Cyberyeti]

I rule with the SB this time, he could easily have the same hand with J♣ being J♦.

Ignoring restricted choice is bad but not bad enough to be disregarded as an available line.

[nige1]

4♠-1 (Declarer probably intended to play for split honours, but he should have spelt out that intention; SB shouldn't anticipate the director's ruling).

[lamford]

How quickly after showing his cards does declarer have to make his statement? "Choose your Poison" is not a clarification statement, and he may have been about to continue before SB began his tirade. If HH had been asked to expand on that he would have stated something like: "If you play a club, or a heart, I discard a diamond from hand, and ruff in dummy; if you play a diamond I will play for split honours." And, finally, if West had been dealt QJ doubleton of diamonds, would declarer be deemed to lose to the jack?

[Cyberyeti]

lamford, on 2016-October-20, 12:13, said:

How quickly after showing his cards does declarer have to make his statement? "Choose your Poison" is not a clarification statement, and he may have been about to continue before SB began his tirade. If HH had been asked to expand on that he would have stated something like: "If you play a club, or a heart, I discard a diamond from hand, and ruff in dummy; if you play a diamond I will play for split honours." And, finally, if West had been dealt QJ doubleton of diamonds, would declarer be deemed to lose to the jack?

Judgement call on speed. If the claimer said immediately "Hang on I was only halfway through my claim statement" then I'd be inclined to believe him.

Declarer is deemed to get this wrong I believe for the reasons stated in the OP so he loses to QJ also.

[barmar]

SB made one mistake: it's 70E, not 73E.

[blackshoe]

Well, clearly the the ruling must go against him.

[barmar]

blackshoe, on 2016-October-20, 15:02, said:

Well, clearly the the ruling must go against him.

Yeah, he's so annoying that we need to find any excuse.

[weejonnie]

It is more likely to be Charlie the Chimp or Papa asking the Rabbit to 'choose your poison' - and HH stepping in (more politely) to prevent RR being conned out of a trick. Since HH plays Double Dummy.

(I am still giving SB a DP for breach of etiquette (failing to call the director politely) as this is a breach of BB@B in London. (Zero Tolerance for you Yanks))

[gnasher]

weejonnie, on 2016-October-21, 02:42, said:

It is more likely to be Charlie the Chimp or Papa asking the Rabbit to 'choose your poison'

I don't think Papa would have played the hand so badly.

[cherdano]

Is this a test whether we hate SB enough that we rule against him even when it is obviously right to rule for him according to the letter, the spirit and the holy ghost of the laws?

[Vampyr]

I remember the hand this story was based on. Why don't you set the original situation as a problem for, say, intermediate players. I think it would be interesting.

[Zelandakh]

We could combine it with Timo's thread and ask: "How would a Turkish AC rule if South were Versace?" Other than that, it seems clear that SB is getting the ruling this time.