[lamford]

---

Table Result NS +620 or -800 depending on how you rule.

West commented, "Everyone seems to have diamonds" on this deal from a North London club last night, and South immediately stated, "I did not mean to bid that, I meant to bid 4H". The TD was called, and South was asked by the TD which call he intended to select when he reached for the bidding box, in line with potentially faulty EBU County Director course guidelines. South admitted that 4D was not a "mechanical error", and he could only suggest that he was lured into bidding diamonds "because everyone had", but 4H was his "intended" bid. Somewhere between him making that decision and his withdrawing 4D from the bidding box, something went wrong and he selected the 4D card. He had heard that one was allowed to change "brain-error-bids" in Holland, and he wondered whether the new liberal approach, that seemed to be prevalent with insufficient bids, also applied in England to errors of this type.

SB, East, thought that South had "intended" to bid 4D, and North would now bid 4S. South could go back to 5H, but North would interpret this as a slam-try and sign-off in 5S, doubled by East for +800 to EW. He was happy to run through the play for the TD if he wished, but the TD told him not to make his own rulings again. How would you rule?

[blackshoe]

Allow North South to change his call. Shoot East.

[lamford]

blackshoe, on 2015-April-22, 13:02, said:

Allow North to change his call. Shoot East.

North had not called yet. Do you allow South to change his call?

[aguahombre]

lamford, on 2015-April-22, 13:03, said:

North had not called yet. Do you allow South to change his call?

Again, NO. 4D remains as the call; and South's statement is UI to North. SB's scenario about North bidding 4S is likely without the UI. I don't know enough about N/S methods to judge whether 5H now by South is impossible and thus whether passing 5H is possible.

Again, and again: South admits to the brain fart, and his use of the term unintended or intended means nothing.

[blackshoe]

lamford, on 2015-April-22, 13:03, said:

North had not called yet. Do you allow South to change his call?

Mistyped. I want to change my call. I meant South.

[lamford]

blackshoe, on 2015-April-22, 17:15, said:

Mistyped. I want to change my call. I meant South.

I am surprised that there are not more prepared to allow the change, or more arguing no change is permitted. "It has all gone quiet over there", as supporters of teams that score chant in some sports. For one interpretation of "unintended call", 4D fits the bill. I was hoping to split the team, as the box aims to do when doubling at backgammon, but instead got mostly silence.

[PeterAlan]

lamford, on 2015-April-23, 07:05, said:

I am surprised that there are not more prepared to allow the change, or more arguing no change is permitted. "It has all gone quiet over there", as supporters of teams that score chant in some sports. For one interpretation of "unintended call", 4D fits the bill. I was hoping to split the team, as the box aims to do when doubling at backgammon, but instead got mostly silence.

I expect everyone's said all that there is to say about the general approach to be taken, and is no longer interested in discussing more and more contrived examples.

[barmar]

PeterAlan, on 2015-April-23, 09:06, said:

I expect everyone's said all that there is to say about the general approach to be taken, and is no longer interested in discussing more and more contrived examples.

Agreed. I don't know why lamford feels the need to create so many SB threads rehashing the same issues from another thread.

[lamford]

PeterAlan, on 2015-April-23, 09:06, said:

I expect everyone's said all that there is to say about the general approach to be taken, and is no longer interested in discussing more and more contrived examples.

Firstly, this example was from actual play, albeit it a couple of years ago rather than this week, so it was hardly contrived. At the time I was West and allowed a correction without calling the TD, as it was a club night and it seemed the "decent thing to do". The essential and substantial difference between this case and the other one (and there were only two, despite barmar's use of the expression "so many" and your use of "more and more"), is that 4D was never "in the mind of the bidder" unlike 1NT in the other example. It was, as aguahombre pointed out, a brain fart. I genuinely have no idea in this case whether the Laws allow it to be changed (although I am pretty sure that the call in the other thread cannot be changed), and I was hoping the cognoscenti on here would offer an opinion. I expect everyone (with the exception of aguahombre and blackshoe, who are split 1-1) is uncertain of the correct ruling. Your response is similar to my aunt who does not do Kakuro puzzles because she has done Sudoku puzzles and she thinks Kakuro are an unnecessary variant.

Furthermore, both you and Blackshoe sought clarification in the other thread of what definition of "unintended" I thought "should" be used, and it was a lot easier to explain by a second example. If you were no longer interested in discussing the issue, why did you ask a supplementary question?