Wednesday, October 2, 2013

congress fun

Yesterday I was informed that I was disqualified from the national bridge Congress. No reasons were specified.

Mr Wayne Burrows

The Director-in-Charge of the National Bridge Congress had disqualified you from further participation in the National Bridge Congress. This has been confirmed by the tournament organiser as required by Law 91B.

Richard Solomon
Convenor
National Bridge Congress Organising Committee

This is a clear and flagrant abuse of the laws of bridge. Law 91B is

Law 91B The director is empowered to disqualify a contestent for cause, subject to approval by the tournament organiser.

It is unclear to me what was considered 'for cause' as no reason has been formally given to me nor was I given any opportunity to attend a hearing.  I will write more on the events leading up to this later.

Law 91B clearly gives the director the right to disqualify a contestant.  However I was not a contestant to which such disqualification can be applied.  I was playing in the New Zealand Teams on a six person team.  That team and not any individual player such as myself was a contestant in this event.        

Contestant: in an individual event, a player; in a pair event, two players playing as partners throughout the event; in a team event, four or more players playing as teammates        

This is plain that the team is the contestant so the director would have to disqualify a team as the power is only given to disqualify contestants.

The events leading up to this incident began in round six of the ten qualifying rounds.  We were playing against National Recorder Noel Woodhall and George Masters. Noel indisputably hesitated over my two club overcall.  This fact has not been challenged. George doubled.  At which point I attempted to establish the facts of the hesitation. George commented, perhaps inappropriately but this was not challenged,  that he had his bid. While my attention was with George on my right, on my left Noel threw his cards and pen on the table so the made an noticable bang. I turned to find him looking intently at me and he made an audible scoff. It was obvious to me that he was showing dissent at me drawing attention to his break in tempo. Although as stated above he never disputed the tempo break.

The director was called. While he came back late to get further information I am unaware of any ruling being made.  Although that is by the by.

The director, Alan Joseph, was also made aware of Noel's  discourtesy. In my view the director essentially ignored the discourtesy.  I briefly left the table to get some water and calm down a little as I was visibly shaken and literally shaking.

Later in the match when we were already well behind time Noel and George had a long uncontested relay auction which was slow which resulted in them taking 12-13 minutes to play one board.  It looked like we were going to forfeit two boards. We ended up forfeiting one board although I suspect we started the last board after time had elapsed.  I couldn't read the time clock nor did I hear the director's announcement of the end of play. When the director was at the table Noel gave an additional back handed insult that we might get finished if I stayed at the table referring to when I left upset.

At the end of the match I approached the director in charge Murray Wiggins to emphasise that I was unhappy with Noel's discourtesy.  Murray talked with Noel and I in the presence of Pam and George and maybe some others. He did not in my view address the discourtesy at all.

I am not completely sure of the sequence of events at this point. The conversation degenerated though. At one point Murray physically pushed me. I was distressed by this so much that I told him that if he touched me again I would call the police. At another point in frustration I said "this is useless if nothing is done about discourtesy". I challenged Murray that it was in his view ok to be discourteous and that if so I would be rude to my opponents. He made it clear that he would send me home if that happened. In my view this is a clear double standard when he allows the National Recorder to be rude to me. There were further threats from Murray that he would send me home. When I showed ambivalence to his threats he acted on the threat.

Later I was informed,  I am not sure by whom but discussions involved Alan Turner, team mate and NZBridge board member,  and Kay Nicholas, chairperson NZBridge, that I was allowed to play so I played the next match. Late in the lunch break I was informed that I was not allowed to play and did not play the last three matches.

Alan Turner and Kay Nicholas both independently asked me to apologise unreservedly to Murray Wiggins. He believed apparently that I said he was useless. I have no recollection of this nor do I believe that he challenged my comment quoted above. I was unwilling to make such an apology. However I did go with Kay Nicholas as a witness to Murray and said I believed that there had been a misunderstanding and that I did not intend any comment I made to be personal to him.  I stated I believed I said that this is useless not he was useless.  Murray did not accept this apology and the conversation degenerated into a he said you said type dispute.

Later Richard Solomon told me that there was no mention of this apology when the committee discussed the decision that resulted in the above letter. He was surprised to learn that an apology had been offered. This illustrates the problem of not allowing me to be heard when they make a decision to impose sanctions against me.
                                                                                                       

3 comments:

Nigel Kearney said...

Wayne, sorry to hear about this. Can you describe further Noel's actions at the table when you claimed there was a break in tempo? There appears to be a typo or something at the moment.

My experience is that NZ Bridge will side with officials over players. In my case, I was assaulted by the team captain at the world championships and pushed backwards down some steps. I ended up on probation for dissent and alleged bad language.

Wayne Burrows said...

Thanks Nigel

I did try and respond the other day but not sure what happened to the reply.

I have edited the post. Noel threw his cards on the table.

Anonymous said...

I've read some of the incidences whereby you feel players have had discourteous and/or rude reactions towards you when you query bids. Your knowledge of laws seems outstanding therefore it may be the delivery of your query that creates the disintegration in 'civilised' discussion at your table.