BCBA Teams 9-13 September

Bulletin – Day 1

Yesterday, the BCBA teams event kicked off slowly. While the tournament itself has started slowly, it marks for us the dawn of a new era of online bridge tournaments.

In today’s bulletin, we are going to tell you a little more about our newly named avatar, as it were. We are also going to share with you some new developments that we have implemented to make the conducting of the tournament smoother.

Bridge From Home

We have, over the past few weeks, been bringing you many events which have, we hope kept you thoroughly entertained and occupied during their currency.  Given your enthusiastic support for our efforts, we have now decided to formalize our association and give it a name. We call ourselves the Bridge From Home team and you will see all our events coming up on our website.

Yesterday’s Results

With just two rounds having been completed, it is a bit early to figure out what will happen. We will just share with you the information that the 12th qualifying team in last weekend’s matches had an average of 11 VPs per round. This will hopefully give players some insights on qualifying targets.

We have had a couple of requests to play 3 rounds today. However, we regret our inability to accommodate these requests. The idea of holding two rounds each on Thursday and Friday was to all of you to play some tournament bridge on these days of the week as well. Holding more than two rounds would inconvenience those teams whose players happen to seriously work from home.

From the Director’s Corner

We have had a couple of reports of psychic bids as well as bids which seemed to be bordering on being ‘non-kosher’ so to speak. Therefore, we are sharing a few thoughts on the topic.

Since psychs are only permitted in the Gold Section, we will not try and define the term. Presumably all players in the section are experienced enough to know the definition of a psych. Further, we would also like to draw your attention to Law 40 C 1 which states that “a player may deviate from announced partnership understandings provided his partner has no more reason than the opponents to be aware of the deviation”. However, it also goes on to state that “Repeated deviations lead to implicit understandings which then form part of the partnership’s methods and must be disclosed in accordance with the regulations governing disclosure of system”.

In short, if somebody does something like open 1NT with a small singleton without alerting that this is a possibility, it could pass by once. But if this happens repeatedly, there is a partnership understanding which is not acceptable.

Another grey area for bidders is the use of pre-empts. Generally, a partnership, especially a regular one, will have an understanding of the range of HCPs that the bidder could have (3-6, 6-9 etc.). It is unlikely that a partnership will open a weak two with a range of 0-11. Hence, it is expected that such normal range is shared with opponents while making the bid.

Schedule

General Conditions of Contest

Entry 

Entries have to be submitted by filling up this form. Those who have informally submitted their entry may please fill this form to confirm it. Entries will be accepted only via submission of this form 

Entries are limited to 30 teams in each section for now.

The organizers reserve the right to reject any entry without assigning any reason whatsoever.

Honoring our volunteers

Like the previous tournaments, we will be donating all contributions made by you to volunteers at our physical tournaments all round the country. We collected close to Rs. 35,000 last week. We could off the top of our heads count over 30 volunteers round the country. 

This is the reason, we have requested a minimum contribution of Rs. 1,000 from each team. We would welcome more and would like to reiterate that this contribution is entirely voluntary. As of date we still short of our targeted contribution of Rs. 1,000 per team. We therefore request those of you who have not yet contributed to seriously consider the same and remit funds

Remittances may be made to the account below.

Account Name The Bombay Contract Bridge Association  

Bank Name HDFC Bank, Malabar Hill Branch IFSC Code HDFC0000625 

Account No 50200037482792      Account Type Current

Once you remit the money, please advise Jenish Shah, someone we are sure most of you know, about your remittances 

Directors

Chief Tournament Director     : Sudhir Agarwal

Gold Tournament                     : Sanjay Chakraborty / Sukrit Vijayakar

Silver Tournament                   : Sukrit Vijayakar / Sanjay Chakraborty

Other senior Tournament Directors may also be called on to assist if necessary

Barometer

Barometer will be switched off throughout.

Kibitzers

During the league, Kibitzing will be switched off.

During the play offs, if both teams agree, Kibitzers may be allowed subject to the proviso that the Director may, at his discretion, switch off Kibitzing.

Undo

During the league, teams may mutually agree to allow undos

During the play offs, undo will remain on, but will be only allowed with the express permission of the director

Psychs

Conventional Pyschs are disallowed in the event

Psychs are disallowed in the Silver Tournament

Psychs are allowed in the Gold Tournament subject to the proviso that an individual does not psych repeatedly and regularly. The opposing team is requested to bring all psychs to the TDs notice to prevent misuse of this facility.

Insufficient Boards

It is the responsibility of both teams to ensure that the match is set up using the correct number of boards. In the event that a match is set up for fewer boards that required, the rest of the boards shall be treated as scratched

Withdrawals

Withdrawals are not allowed after a draw has been made. Teams withdrawing in this manner will not be allowed to play in the next event.

Post qualification, withdrawals are not permitted. Teams withdrawing will not be allowed to play in the next event.

Ethical Behavior

We expect all participants to adhere to the highest standards of ethical behavior during the play of this tournament. While we find it painful to issue such a statement, it is equally painful to admit that making such a statement has been felt necessary by the organisers. Players whose behavior was reported as suspect are being watched by the CTD as well as other senior directors of the country.

Miscellaneous

Anything not covered here is at the discretion of the organizers. They may opt to consult with one or more senior bridge players / organizers, but their decision will be final and binding in all respects