[daveharty]

The connection issues were so bad during the last quarter of the Nickell vs. Cayne Spingold semifinal last night that I finally gave up and went to bed, so of course it turned out to be a classic. Anybody have any info about an appeal by the Cayne team that was denied?

[pigpenz]

is this the one over when Cayne fell alseep and thought his spades were all good?
or was it something different, this one seemed to occur at the end of the 2nd quarter.
Cause that was 5 imps Nickell got they didnt deserve.

[Phil]

If its the misclaim from the 1st Quarter, I think the director and AC did the right thing based on what the VG operator said.

[mtvesuvius]

---

Trumps were hearts, with declarer needing 3 of the last 4 to make his contract. The spots and opponent's cards are approximate. The lead is in the South hand.

Cayne claimed without stating a line. It was decided that because he did not state a line of play, he was confident his 3rd spade would be good, and therefore would finish one down.

He could of course safety play the hand by pitching the ♦K, but if he were sure that his 3rd spade was good, there would be no need for that.

[mrdct]

The vugraph records seem to indicate that Cayne actually cashed the ♠A and ♠J before the claim, pitching ♣s from dummy, with the operator stating:

"director called now since Jimmy played AJ6 of spades and W claimed last two tricks for down one Jimmy is stating that he didnt do that and claimed two"

I guess Cayne must have argued that it would beyond "careless or inferior" to play a 3rd round of ♠ when east showed-out when he cashed the ♠A.

However, doubtful points invariably get resolved against the claimer and it looks like the TD determined the facts on the basis that Cayne did indeed believe all of his ♠s were cashing.

On the info available here, I think the TD and AC probably got this right.

I think this thread belongs in Laws Forum.

[Free]

TD and AC got this right imo.

[nigel_k]

No doubt the failure to foresee that spades might not break was careless or inferior for a player of Cayne's class, but the suggestion that declarer would not notice when East didn't follow to a top spade surely goes beyond that. It is somewhat close but I would rule contract making. However, directors and committees do seem to enjoy making the claimer pay a heavy price even in a situation where they would basically never have gone down had they played the hand out. So I am not surprised by the decision.

[Foxx]

daveharty, on 2011-July-31, 08:06, said:

The connection issues were so bad during the last quarter of the Nickell vs. Cayne Spingold semifinal last night that I finally gave up and went to bed, so of course it turned out to be a classic.

Nickell / Cayne matches usually are. They have a rivalry that goes a long way back.

I was watching the match on Vugraph at the time, and the ruling was shocking to say the least. That the hand turned out to be (one of) the deciding factor(s) only put a crown on the drama. It'd be interesting to know what the kibitzing crowd has to say about this, next time Cayne plays a BBO team match.

[rduran1216]

if he claimed the last 4 tricks at that spot then down 1 is justified. if he claimed 3 more, how could any person think he should be down? Someone please give detail as to what happened cause it looks like bs as presented here...id be pissed.

[aguahombre]

I believe Adam's post (#4) accurately states all we are going to know about the situation. The claim apparently included nothing about losing one trick, so the ruling was the loss of the last two tricks via continuing spades.

[JLOGIC]

rduran1216, on 2011-August-15, 00:32, said:

if he claimed the last 4 tricks at that spot then down 1 is justified. if he claimed 3 more, how could any person think he should be down? Someone please give detail as to what happened cause it looks like bs as presented here...id be pissed.

If he claimed 3 tricks of course there would be no problem. When you claim there without stating a line, you are claiming all of the tricks because you miscounted spades.

[Gerben42]

Why do people not state a line when they are claiming? I mean they aren't newbies... Some people just can't be helped.

[JLOGIC]

Gerben42, on 2011-August-16, 14:23, said:

Why do people not state a line when they are claiming? I mean they aren't newbies... Some people just can't be helped.

When you have all of the tricks there is no point in stating a line. I would say almost all claims in high level matches have no stated line because they are self explanatory. Yes you could state a line every single time you claim to cater to the fact that you miscounted something, but if you almost never miscount anything this is just a waste of time.

[barmar]

This is the kind of field where you could just show your hand and the opponents would understand that you're claiming on a progressive squeeze.