At a recent club game, the hand was as follows (hands rotated):
DUMMY (north) S: Axx H: x D: Qxxx C: AKTxx
DECLARER S: KQJxx H: xxx D: Axxx C: Jxx
The contract was four spades doubled. I, West, lead a small club. It went to partner's winning Queen. After pulling a 3-2 trump suit ending in dummy, declarer led the C-A. On this, he pitched a heart, establishing a revoke. Then, he continued with the KT, pitching the remainder of the Hearts. Both defenders were then looking at each other in confusion, since only 11 clubs seemed to exist. On the final club, declarer overtook in his hand with the Jack. He then came to this position in his hand:
xx --- Axxx x
He'd already cashed 3 clubs and 3 trumps. After cashing one more club, the D-A, and two more spades, he claimed his contract. Obviously, there should be a two trick penalty and an automatic first down just for the revoke, but how much more should we get for rectification? At the table, we got three tricks back, for -3 or 500. That was a "0", for 4H is cold for 620. For the record, the C-Q was a tripleton offsides. What should the score have been?
In addition, the declarer actually only got 9 tricks: 5 spades, 1 diamond, and four clubs. Also, sincle declarer wouldn't've been able to ruff the hearts in dummy (since he pulled trump) had the revoke not occurred, does that play into the penalty?
I'm going to answer this in two parts, because I want to clarify, and seperate the first part, it's so very important.
In this case, there is NOT an automatic 2 trick penalty (rectification), there is only a 1 trick rectification. The ONLY time there is automatically a 2 trick transfer is when, the OFFENDER wins the revoke trick, (contributes the highest trump to the trick), AND, the offening SIDE wins the revoke trick and at least one or more tricks subsequent to the revoke.
This is a change from the laws prior to the Sept, 2009 laws. The law USED to be: if the offender takes a trick with a card he could have contributed to the revoke trick, then that and one of any subsequent tricks will be transferred. This would be the situation you'ver outlined - and no longer applies.
The Laws of Duplicate Contract Bridge don't recognize offsides, 4 downs, touchdowns, touchbacks, or endzones....no 1st down, automatic or otherwise. No automatic first down, no 15 yards, no roughing the passer (although you are allowed to ruff the leader).
The laws require us, the directors, to EITHER apply the appropriate rectification under the laws, OR restore equity (determine the most likely outcome, and adjust the board to THAT result), had the revoke not occurred.
Under no circumstances do we both restore equity, and then apply the penalty.
Since the trumps were "drawn, ending in dummy", I would assume that the "equitable" result would be making 4 - 5 spades, 4 clubs, and 1 diamond. The non-offenders are entitled to rectification or equity, whichever is better for them. Therefore - 4S X, down 2 seems to be the best result possible for the non-offenders, and is the correct ruling.
