A recent circular issued by the Malta Bridge Association (MBA) draws attention to some changes in the laws of duplicate Bridge which the World Bridge Federation (WBF) recommends should be implemented by the end of this month.
Most of the items listed in the circular are mere reminders or further clarifications of existing rules.
The real serious changes are in the revoke rule (Law 64) and the law regarding insufficient bids (Law 27).
As far as the revoke rule is concerned, we have now returned almost entirely to pre-1997 rules.
First of all, defenders can now again ask each other "having none partner?" It is worth noting that the largest Bridge NBO in the world, the ACBL never accepted or adopted this change.
Looks like they won the day.
That should put paid to the argument that you cannot play Bridge unless you adopt all the WBF rules.
Another classic example which proves this point is the fact that many on-line Bridge tournaments nowadays do not allow psychic bids. Yet, many of these tournaments are sanctioned by the WBF.
The complication of winning subsequent tricks with the revoke card has again been removed from the penalty assessment procedure.
This makes life easier for the director, but is it fair?
Now, very simply, if the offender won the revoke trick, it must be returned to the non-offending side. In addition, if the offending partnership wins any subsequent tricks, they must give another trick to the non-offending side.
Well, at least, that was made easy.
The changes made to law 27 are far more complex. Let's look at part of the exact wording of this new law.
(b) If, except as in (a), the insufficient bid is corrected with a legal call that in the director's opinion has the same meaning* as, or a more precise meaning* than, the insufficient bid (such meaning being fully contained within the possible meanings of the insufficient bid) the auction proceeds without further rectification.
Surely, it is not possible for the playing director to give a ruling on this law unless he happens to have played the hand earlier.
Meanwhile, play at this table cannot continue until a ruling is given. Even when the director has played the hand there are likely to be problems.
Most playing directors are hardly likely to be knowledgeable enough about all bidding systems to decide whether the corrected bid is actually a subset of the group of meanings contained in the insufficient bid and therefore legal.