Wednesday, April 12, 2006

Strange Partner Effect

In the title 'strange' does not (probably) apply to your usual partner.

It means the partner you play with when your usual is unavailable. It can often be someone who you have never played with before. What is the 'effect'?

I have noticed that partnerships like these often succeed well beyond expectations. It is often the case that a good player is partnering a much weaker one and the weaker player experiences a rare victory.

This does seem to defy all logic. The partnership that wins is by definition quite a weak one. There is rarely time to lay all but a few basic conventions let alone discuss signals and discards. The reason for it would seem to me to be psychological. Both players have to concentrate far more than usual if they are to succeed. They can take nothing for granted, they need to question every bid partner makes and make sure their own bidding is a clear to partner as possible.

Obscure leads and plays are not used. In addition the players treat each other with a courtesy and decorum rare among regular partnerships. Post-mortems usually take the form of an apology for misleading partner by using a bid not discussed rather than an accusation that partner has forgotten the system.

I have known these partnerships to fail occasionally- the reasons are probably complicated but I know that if someone had asked if the two players would do well together I would have been able to give a fairly definite 'no' before they sat down at the table!

All of which is food for thought and has implications (I think) for the way that regular partnerships function. What is your view?

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