[Jinksy]

Director!

There's a few things to rule on here. I don't feel terribly hard done by on the ruling we received at the table, but am curious whether in a more serious event things might have gone differently:

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Match pointed event.

In case relevant, E/W play regular Landy.

1N was announced as 15-17 - but their agreement was in fact 12-14.

In the play, I (W) got 8H lead, won in hand, and 'knowing' the QS was with S I played to the K and ran the J hoping to drop the 10. When it lost, I asked again about 1N, N repeated 15-17, and S now corrected him. We called a director, who told us to play it out (and reprimanded S for correcting her P during play).

In the end, he transferred the trick back to me, and observed that, had we known it was weak, we might have bid to either 3N (making) or 4S (going off), and since we couldn't know which, he'd leave the result as it was. I said that seemed pretty reasonable, but looking at the hand afterwards, I felt that E bidding 4S (when 5 has shown 5+) is a bit of a stretch.

Since I think overcalls of a weak NT should be constructive (so you can find game), on the E hand, I think I would personally have blasted 3N had I known S had a weak NT. Even if you content yourself with 2N, it makes the same number of tricks as Ss, so we would have got a better score.

How would you rule, given all the uncertainty? In general how optimistic a view of their competence/luck are the victims of an infraction entitled to?

[Cyberyeti]

Well 4♠ makes on a heart lead anyway, and you will play it correctly.

Win the heart, in hand, take the spade finesse, return to hand play the ace of spades pitching a club (diamond also works), south must pitch a club, now exit with the spade pitching a club and south is squeezed on this trick. You can always force him to lead from his ♥J9 into dummy's A10 once he's pitched on the 4th and 5th spades.

[mycroft]

Ignoring the Yeti for a minute (who has a point)...

I can see ruling that a reasonable weighting of 3NT=/4♠-1 scores worse than 2♠+1 on this hand against this field, so you weren't damaged. Which isn't what (you tell us) this director said, but easily could have been what was meant. That is an absolutely correct ruling (L12B and L12C1c). For instance:

• Many tables don't overcall the "flat, min" West hand.
  
• Reasonable play (in that club) leads to 5 tricks, so there's a lot of N/S -100 around.
  
• 2♠+1, N/S -140 therefore scores, say, 15 on a 24 top (halve both numbers if you're ACBL-ian).
  
• Now, game making would be 22ish, and a negative score would be about 3.
  
• Half and half is 25/2 = 12.5 MPs, which is less than the 15 the assigned score for the play due to MI.

Note: all numbers and percentages argumentum ad fundamentum, for illustration only.

How much you weigh the Yeti's "but I'll make 4♠ on the obvious line" into that score, and whether that affects anything, is a thing.

Also, I don't know how easy scoring weighted scores in the EBU is for club directors (I know it's easier than with ACBLscor - as in there's a way to do it in the program - but this is a complicated one) and I can see this being "easier and close enough". Not that I agree with that attitude, but I've seen much worse from club directors (and the last time I had to make a weighted ruling, it took the better part of 3 rounds to do all the work, only to enter "-1MP" (on a 7 top) as my adjustment from the reasonable non-weighted ruling. Not saying I won't do it next time - of course I will, and next time it could be near-half of a board - but there were more productive things I could have done keeping the game moving with that time).

[P_Marlowe]

Hi,

depending on your agreement set, you may have been hurt.
If 2S against a strong NT is just comp., the lower floor could be lower, and 12 already,
maybe only slightly, after all you did enter,
above your upper floor for an intervention, you could make a case for adjustment.

But you would need to state your agreements clearly to make the case.
For us, the West hand would be too strong to enter vs. a strong NT (and the shape is also not
covered by our agreement set). East could enter, due to 4th seat, but it is close.

If East entered, I have no idea, what would happen, ...

[pescetom]

Late to the thread, but unless the opps are beginners I think you have every reason to complain about both their behaviour - North does not know the agreed NT range (?!) and South feels free to correct him - and the Director's salomonic decision. I think you at the time and others here gave Director too much rope too, not only does the vaguely possible 4♠ make on anything but the unlikely diamonds lead, but you were surely likely to reach 3NT with the correct explanation of 1NT. If 2♠ over 15-17 1NT really meets your agreements then I think you deserve adjustment to 3NT making (with some percentage of 4♠ making if your methods really might lead there) and if opps are not beginners I think they deserve a penalty too.