[nige1]

SBU. Local congress. Match-pointed pairs final. Experienced players in regular partnerships. Facts not in dispute (director is reading book beside table). Skeleton system-cards but both sides summarise their system, including opening 1N ranges before playing a board. Over East's 1N opener, South hestitates for a few seconds and asks the range. West says "11-14". South and West pass. North doubles. When asked, South says "Protective". EW draw attention to South's (agreed) hesitation. EW ask the director, who says "play on". Table-result: 1NX-2 (NS +300). EW claim damage. Your ruling?

---

[barmar]

Adjust to undoubled down 2, unless NS can convince me that they ALWAYS reopen with a weak NT hand of their own, which seems unlikely. Otherwise, Pass is an LA, while double is suggested by the UI.

[chrism]

Are NT ranges announceable in the SBU? If so, it is entirely normal to wait for an announcement, and ask if one is not forthcoming. In that case, there should be a presumption of no UI. Indeed, failing to establish the NT range would pass the UI that South had no intention of acting no matter what the NT range.

If announcements are not required, then I will change my vote to 1N undoubled down 2.

[blackshoe]

It appears there are no announcements in Scotland. The SBU alert regulation says "At the start of a round or match pairs should acquaint each other with their basic system, length of their one-level openings, and strength and style of their opening 1NT. Subsequent questions about these, whilst legal, may be regarded as conveying unauthorised information." From the OP, EW did comply with this regulation. So I would rule there has been an infraction of Law 16B1{a}, and adjust the score per Law 16B3 and 12C1 to 1NT-2, NS +100. I would remind the players that the time to establish a BIT is when it occurs, not later.

[billw55]

Agree with NS +100, unless there is a special provision about announcements.

As a practical matter, what was south doing? He likes his diamonds, it would seem, then asks for a range, gets the lowest possible, and still passes? Odd (again, unless the issue is an expected announcement).

[barmar]

It's common not to interfere over weak NT unless you have something like an opening hand. He has a nice diamond suit, but his hand may not be good enough to overcall with in his style.

On the other hand, he might want to make an obstructive bid over strong NT.

[nige1]

chrism, on 2014-May-19, 09:55, said:

Are NT ranges announceable in the SBU? If so, it is entirely normal to wait for an announcement, and ask if one is not forthcoming. In that case, there should be a presumption of no UI. Indeed, failing to establish the NT range would pass the UI that South had no intention of acting no matter what the NT range.
If announcements are not required, then I will change my vote to 1N undoubled down 2.

Blackshoe is right: In the SBU, you pre-announce a summary of your methods, including opening notrump ranges, before play; but don't announce them, during the auction.

[WellSpyder]

Seems to me an easy decision to adjust here.

Incidentally, anyone else feel the explanation of the double as "protective" is not exactly helpful? Leaving aside the general proscription on using just a name to describe an agreement, this name conveys nothing to me about what sort of hand is being shown.

[aguahombre]

WellSpyder, on 2014-May-20, 04:10, said:

Seems to me an easy decision to adjust here.

Incidentally, anyone else feel the explanation of the double as "protective" is not exactly helpful? Leaving aside the general proscription on using just a name to describe an agreement, this name conveys nothing to me about what sort of hand is being shown.

Quite right. It is the same as saying the Double is a balancing action --- well, duh, I think we already knew that.

[paulg]

barmar, on 2014-May-19, 12:45, said:

It's common not to interfere over weak NT unless you have something like an opening hand. He has a nice diamond suit, but his hand may not be good enough to overcall with in his style.

On the other hand, he might want to make an obstructive bid over strong NT.

Sorry, I disagree.

At adverse vulnerability and matchpoints, I cannot think of a hand where I would pass over a weak no-trump but bid over a strong no-trump unless I was playing a different defence. It is a lot more important to compete over a weak no-trump.

[TMorris]

barmar, on 2014-May-19, 12:45, said:

It's common not to interfere over weak NT unless you have something like an opening hand. He has a nice diamond suit, but his hand may not be good enough to overcall with in his style.

On the other hand, he might want to make an obstructive bid over strong NT.

Sometime last year an top class England international on vugraph made a similar comment ie competition over a weak NT should be constructive. It was somewhat ironic to me as playing against him a couple of weeks earlier he had competed all vulnerable on a complete pile of rubbish (about a 5 count) in the hope that his partner had enough to bail him out and/or we would misdefend.

I disagree with the comment then and now - get in over a weak NT especially non-vul.

[ahydra]

TMorris, on 2014-May-20, 12:50, said:

Sometime last year an top class England international on vugraph made a similar comment ie competition over a weak NT should be constructive. It was somewhat ironic to me as playing against him a couple of weeks earlier he had competed all vulnerable on a complete pile of rubbish (about a 5 count) in the hope that his partner had enough to bail him out and/or we would misdefend.

I disagree with the comment then and now - get in over a weak NT especially non-vul.

Andrew Robson also wrote a recent article to this effect in English Bridge, even advocating Landy on 4-4 etc.

ahydra

[Zelandakh]

ahydra, on 2014-May-21, 04:18, said:

Andrew Robson also wrote a recent article to this effect in English Bridge, even advocating Landy on 4-4 etc.

If going down this route I think it is better to play one of the old-fashioned but still reasonable 3-suited defences such as Cansino or Sharples. You can adapt these to compete on most half-decent hands. This a different mentality from Asptro, M-L, etc though; in those the idea is that the hand with shape takes action; in the 3-suited methods the hand with some values gets into the auction and then we scramble to a playable spot.

Silly question, but did N-S not announce their NT range at the beginning of the round? That would seem to be a pretty glaring omission within the local regulations. Finally, I still have no idea what the explanation is meant to mean and find it strange noone asked a supplementary.

[barmar]

Zelandakh, on 2014-May-30, 03:30, said:

Silly question, but did N-S not announce their NT range at the beginning of the round? That would seem to be a pretty glaring omission within the local regulations. Finally, I still have no idea what the explanation is meant to mean and find it strange noone asked a supplementary.

Yes, they did. The OP said: "Skeleton system-cards but both sides summarise their system, including opening 1N ranges before playing a board."


I assume that "protective" is similar to "balancing" -- you're doubling with moderate values in case partner had a decent hand that was not able to act in direct position.

[aguahombre]

paulg, on 2014-May-20, 11:51, said:

Sorry, I disagree.

At adverse vulnerability and matchpoints, I cannot think of a hand where I would pass over a weak no-trump but bid over a strong no-trump unless I was playing a different defence. It is a lot more important to compete over a weak no-trump.

What you are disagreeing with is (as Barry said) a common policy. The idea is that a direct overcall of a strong NT is recognized as merely competitive because it is so rare we would consider being in game; but, after a weak NT, overcalls should have the playing strength of a 2-level overcall of a suit opening so CHO can advance constructively. Coming in with a weak single suit or 2-suiter over a weak NT is inviting partner to create a disaster.

[barmar]

I still remember one of the first times I played against someone playing mini-NT. They explained (after the round) that one of the things they liked about it was that less experience opponents thought it was "safe" to compete with garbage because opener is so limited. But it's not opener you have to worry about, it's his partner.

[blackshoe]

Somewhere I read a mini-NT described as "I have a limit raise for you here partner, what do you want to do with it?"

[Zelandakh]

barmar, on 2014-June-01, 20:41, said:

But it's not opener you have to worry about, it's hisyour partner.

FYP

[aguahombre]

Zel and Barry seem to be having fun with each other, here. But both have important points...neither with much to do about rulings, but rather about weak NT.

The threat level of competing over a weak NT is pretty much the same as that of coming in direct seat with 2 (lower) over a normal 1x Opening. Both Responder and Partner are alive and are wild cards to be feared if we are messing around.

[FrancesHinden]

ahydra, on 2014-May-21, 04:18, said:

Andrew Robson also wrote a recent article to this effect in English Bridge, even advocating Landy on 4-4 etc.

ahydra

Robson's article was specifically about tactics at matchpointed pairs

For the full chapter & verse on defending weak NT vs strong NT you need to read my artcile in August english bridge.