Misbid or Mis-agreement?
I opened 1d and RHO 3c alerted, described as "CRO, so Hearts and Clubs, at least 5/5".
We played in 4s and partner completely misplayed it on assumption of the description. RHO actually had a weak jump overcall with 7 clubs.
Partner called Director, who asked to see convention card, which said CRO, so correct explanation, unfortunate (for us) misbid and no redress. I would have done the same as TD. But....
I am sure I have seen same player make the same mistake before, but not recently. At which point can we claim that he's not playing CRO and their convention card is wrong, and hence it was was not a correct explanation of the system he is playing?
Comments
If the player's partner appears to act in a way that might be catering for this mis-bid, that would be evidence that their agreement might not really be as stated. It's certainly something that would benefit from the TD making further enquiries.
Any time you see a player in that partnership allowing for the possibility that their partner might have only hearts, you should call the director after the hand on suspicion of a fielded misbid. For example, if the bidding ever goes (1!d), 3!c; 3!h, 4!c; Pass, that would be strong evidence that the explanation of 3!c you're hearing is not the actual partnership agreement.
In the last case a player holding three hearts and two clubs, or indeed two hearts and one club, would surely be in honour bound to revert to H and failure to do so would be clear evidence of fielding.
This is very similar to those Opponents who use an "Asptro" type 2C or 2D over my 1NT to show H and a minor or Spades and another then they follow it up with a VERY firmly placed 3C or 3D to show a single-suited minor; I have (almost verbatim) used mikeindex's words to a miscreant in these Blue Book 3C3 cases.
The auction was:
1d - (3c!) - 3s - p
4s
RHO (a very ethical player) had 6 points and being red against green didn't get involved. So didn't field it or do anything that would if Gordon's words "act in a way that might be catering for this mis-bid, that would be evidence that their agreement might not really be as stated". Pass was always a clear but bid.
What I'm getting at is how often do we allow lefty to make this misbid before taking action? Or do we just have to keep our powder dry until righty fields the misbid?
I assume RHO didn't have five hearts?
In this case, I don't believe there's much you can do, until such time as a fielded misbid occurs. The only thing distinguishing this situation from a legal situation (LHO psyching the two-suited bid) is what LHO was thinking at the time they made the bid, and it's very hard to punish players for things like internal thoughts.
For what it's worth, I've been on the other side of this situation. I was sitting with a very weak hand with 4-3 in the majors, and heard a 1NT opening on the right. I psyched a 2!c call (which in my partnership showed a rather stronger hand and 4-4 or better in the majors), my partner described it correctly, and the opponents ended up in 3NT, relied on the information from my call and went down (those may not have been connected – I think 3NT might have gone down anyway – but the declarer thought they were). The declarer got very angry, even after I explained that it was a psyche and I knew exactly what my bid meant in the partnership, and my partner had bid appropriately based on what they thought I had (as I expected; it was a new partnership and my partner had no reason to think I'd psyche, nor that I would have forgotten the bid). The director ruled (correctly) that no irregularity had happened.
My case and your case are probably different, but we can't enforce any sort of punishment or correction until there's some observable difference between them. If the partner fields, then that's something that the partnership can be penalised for. If the partner never fields, then that's likely to be its own punishment, as the partnership repeatedly ends up going down in hopeless heart contracts.
@GrahamC said:
L40C. Deviation from System and Psychic Action
1. A player may deviate from his side’s announced understandings, provided that his partner
has no more reason than the opponents to be aware of the deviation
If someone in a partnership regularly misbids then their partner will soon come to have more reason than opponents to be aware of the likelihood of a deviation. Even if he never fields it, he's still obliged to comment that partner often forgets.
I don't think that concentrating on the bridge actions taken by the partner of the misbidder is key. After all, we don't any longer have a policy of adjusting for fielded misbids. What is important is that if the partner knows that the agreement is "hearts and clubs" but that the misbidder is prone to forget and make the bid with just clubs, that is information to which the opponents are entitled. If declarer from the OP knew that "it's supposed to show hearts and clubs, but he sometimes forgets and has just clubs", then he would have been in possession of the correct information about his opponents' methods. He would have had a chance to play the overcaller for just clubs - a guess, to be sure, but there may have been indications that pointed in that direction. Without the caveat in the explanation, he would have had little chance (unless he had been a victim of such a forget before).
I should have prefaced my last post by quoting and agreeing with this :)