Penalty Cards

Most players are convinced that they know exactly how to deal with exposed cards without recourse to the Tournament Director. "It's simple, isn't it?" they say. "The card must be played at the first legal opportunity."

Unfortunately that is only half the story and many players disadvantage themselves by not asking for the Director.

The first thing to mention is that declarer may not have a penalty card. The offending card is just restored to his hand.

Major or Minor?

Minor penalty cards are very rare animals indeed since they must be single cards, below honour rank, which have become exposed accidentally. The most likely scenario is when a player, in playing one card, pulls out a second card which falls face-up on the table. Any deliberate action in playing a card and then withdrawing the play (as in leading out of turn, or correcting an unestablished revoke) results in a major penalty card. Additionally, honour cards are always major penalty cards as are instances of more than one penalty card.

Minor Penalty Card Restrictions

A minor penalty card does not have to be played at the first legal opportunity, nor are there any penalties imposed on the partner of the offender if he is on lead.

The only penalty is that the offender may not play a non-honour in the suit of the penalty card before the penalty card itself. For example, if South has ♥7 as a minor penalty card and♥ A-10-6-3 in hand, he can play ♥A or♥10 before ♥7 but not ♥6 or ♥3. When discarding, he can throw away any card in any other suit before ♥7, but not ♥6 or ♥3.

Major Penalty Card Restrictions

You will no doubt be pleased to hear that a major penalty card does have to be played at the first legal opportunity, but is that the whole story?

Let's consider the following scenario.

South is the declarer and West has ♥A on the table as a major penalty card. East wins a trick and immediately leads ♥2 to the next trick.

South immediately calls for the Tournament Director - but why?

"Hold on!" South tells the Director. "I don't want a heart lead. I want East to lead a spade!"

A.  Can declarer ban a heart lead?

B.  Can he insist on a spade lead?

Firstly, East is in receipt of unauthorised information arising from his partner's ♥A and (Law 50D2) he is forbidden from leading until declarer has exercised one of the following choices. He may forbid or require the lead of a heart but, if he does so, ♥A is restored to West's hand and no longer has to be played at the first legal opportunity. He may also not exercise any restriction, in which case ♥A remains on the table to be played at the first legal opportunity. The one thing he can't do is require the lead of another specified suit.

You probably unwittingly already knew all of this since the choices above are three of the five that occur when an opening lead out of turn is made. After all if the lead is not accepted we have the partner of a player with a major penalty card on lead.

In the situation above, if declarer were to ban a heart lead, East's ♥2 would remain on the table as major penalty card but East would have to lead another suit. So, should East lead a club to his partner's Ace, West would now be on lead as the partner of a player with a major penalty card and declarer could ban a heart lead yet again!

If you are really not a very nice person,

I am sure you can see that you could use this knowledge to your advantage. All you have to do as declarer is not to say anything until the partner of the player with the Penalty Card has led - and then call for the Director! But I'm sure that HNSBC does not have any members who are that devious, does it?

Two or More Penalty Cards

When a player has more than one penalty card and has a choice of which card to play to a trick, declarer can choose which card is to be played.

If the partner of the offender is on lead the three options above still apply, but if declarer requires or forbids the lead of a suit all the offender's cards in that suit can be restored to his hand.

Failure to Play a Penalty Card

It is not uncommon for a player to forget to play a penalty card at the first legal opportunity. When this happens the card he attempts to play also becomes a major penalty card and declarer can choose which one should be played.