[olegru]

In the middle of the hand West on lead and he aware that the rest of the ♠ suit distributed as:

....……..10x
QJ……...........……Kxxx
.....……..x

West needs his partner to overtake his card and return to another suit. East is a very weak player, who is not able to figure out anything by himself.
So West plays the ♠J in hope that East will place ♠Q with a declarer and took trick with ♠King. After it East would have ~43% chance to find the correct return. (7 cards left, 3 in the right suit ...… )

Declarer, player the same caliber as East, waving his partner to play and placing his small spade on the table before East played the card.
East, seeing that partner’s ♠Jack will hold the trick, happily plays the small spade.

Complain about irregularity in that company would be absurd, but I am still curious what law says about it.

[weejonnie]

Law 23 would be a good starting point.

Whenever, in the opinion of the Director, an offender could have been aware at the time of his irregularity that this could well damage the non-offending side, the Director shall require the auction and play to continue (if not completed). When the play has been completed, the Director awards an adjusted score if he considers the offending side has gained an advantage through the irregularity*.

* As, for example, by partner’s enforced pass.

PS = why can't you complain (report an irregularity?)

[blackshoe]

weejonnie, on 2016-August-12, 14:55, said:

PS = why can't you complain (report an irregularity?)

Indeed, a director call isn't a complaint in the first place, or at least it shouldn't be. There was an irregularity. You call the director to sort it out. Bridge players should say, at this point, "what's the problem (with calling the TD)?" because there isn't one. Just do it.

[olegru]

weejonnie, on 2016-August-12, 14:55, said:

Law 23 would be a good starting point.
Whenever, in the opinion of the Director, an offender could have been aware at the time of his irregularity that this could well damage the non-offending side...

Sorry, I was not explicit in the original post.
By director's opinion the offender was not aware that the irregularity could damage the non-offending side by any way. The idea that one of the opponents could play the false card in order to trick his partner into the correct play is beyond her imagination. Even attempt to explain how non-offending side was damaged the most probably would fail on both Declarer and East.
I don't think law 23 is applied here.

Quote

PS = why can't you complain (report an irregularity?)

Sorry, old joke

Quote

- Mom, I don't want to go to school today, those boys and girls are so nasty.
- Sorry, son, you have no choice. You are the principal of the school.

The one of the reason do not report irregularity was the simple fact that as a playing director I had nobody to report. All what I found appropriate was to ask the declarer to make sure she plays cards only when it is her turn to play.

[Vampyr]

olegru, on 2016-August-15, 09:12, said:

Sorry, I was not explicit in the original post.
By director's opinion the offender was not aware that the irregularity could damage the non-offending side by any way. The idea that one of the opponents could play the false card in order to trick his partner into the correct play is beyond her imagination. Even attempt to explain how non-offending side was damaged the most probably would fail on both Declarer and East.
I don't think law 23 is applied here.

"Could have been aware" is not the same as "was aware". I think that Law 23 should be fairly liberally applied.

Quote

The one of the reason do not report irregularity was the simple fact that as a playing director I had nobody to report. All what I found appropriate was to ask the declarer to make sure she plays cards only when it is her turn to play.

A playing director just calls over one of the other directors playing in the room. Happens all the time in my experience.

[blackshoe]

Assuming there are such.

[Vampyr]

blackshoe, on 2016-August-15, 16:09, said:

Assuming there are such.

If there aren't the club should send some people on courses. It is not fair if one person has to take on the director duties every week.

[blackshoe]

Ain't no courses over here. Well, not many - and a club that has to rely on playing directors probably can't afford to send anybody anywhere.

[Vampyr]

blackshoe, on 2016-August-15, 22:44, said:

Ain't no courses over here. Well, not many - and a club that has to rely on playing directors probably can't afford to send anybody anywhere.

The latter is not necessarily true; after all it is more economical to send a few people on a course once than to pay a director every time. Even directors without formal training direct at the local club if they want to. Most rulings are out of the book anyway.

But in any case a solution for a club that has few qualified directors and can't afford courses, or courses are not available, is for the qualified person to hold a seminar. I did this at my house twice for local clubs. One day of training is better than none, and you can also give a quiz to ensure that they know their way around the Lawbook. At least the ACBL have a table of contents! If there are not enough Lawbooks available it is OK, because they can take the quiz at different times, or two could share a book and work together.

[blackshoe]

Sure. I suppose there's always something that can be done.

[mycroft]

We held a director's course in Calgary in March. I expected it to be good but sparsely attended. We had 12. From what I saw, no more than 3 were in it "to learn, no interest in actually directing".

Which is good. However, we now have a whole bunch of new TDs who need to learn "in the trenches", and I really hope it's happening in conjunction with experienced TDs/mentors (which reminds me, I should let the team know I'm happy to mentor/be a question sink for the new TDs). Also, since several of the new TDs are also newer players (or, at least, not au fait with local "good player stratification"), I hope they're getting some guidance as to who to ask for judgement rulings when, for instance, it's <frequent national player>, or <very good flight A player who thinks she's national level>, or <very good flight A player who bids like a maniac>, or <graduated flight B player>, or me, playing <stupid system nobody else ever plays> (or "me, playing old-fashioned system lots of people used to play", for that matter), or <new graduate from the 199er game>.

It will settle out, as before. I do guess it's going to mean that I won't be needed for a regular game if I don't host it any time soon. Which is a disappointment, but it means one more game I can play in.

Spoiler

It was held within walking distance of my house. I told the presenters (both very competent TDs and good flight A players) that I figured I'd just show up for some of it and kibitz, "just to find out what was being taught these days". I then complained that their response was a ZT violation (which it absolutely was, of course, as well as entirely appropriate and what I expected).