There are a lot of boules on the ground. Team A has the point and one unplayed boule. Team B should play next, if they have any unplayed boules.
Team A asks Team B if they have any more boules to play. Team B says “No, we’re out.” So Team A plays its last boule. Then one of the players on Team B says “Ooops! I still have one boule left!”
Should Team B be allowed to play its forgotten boule?
In this post I present reasons for ruling that Team B should NOT be allowed to play its forgotten boule.
In this situation, the bottom line is that Team A gave Team B the opportunity to play next, and Team B refused to do so. We don’t know why Team B refused. Perhaps Team B genuinely made a mistake. Perhaps they deliberately tried to cheat. We can’t retroactively read their minds, so we can never be sure. But it makes no difference why they violated the rules (General Principle #1). Carelessness and sloppiness are just as unacceptable as deliberate cheating. The bottom line is that Team B broke the rules.
The judgement that Team B broke the rules rests on the premise that it is a violation of the rules to refuse to play when it is your team’s turn to play. Just as a boule can be played contrary to the rules, a boule can be withheld from play contrary to the rules.
An alternative interpretation of the rules would hold that Team B, in refusing to play when it was their turn to do so, in effect declared that they had played all of the boules that they intended to play, and in doing so they gave up the right to play any more boules.
Under either interpretation, the bottom line is— Team B may not play their last boule. A forgotten boule is dead and may not be played.
The Forgotten Boule and the Boule Advantage
Most importantly, there is a very pragmatic reason for why a team must not be allowed to play a “forgotten” boule. It is connected to the notion of the boule advantage. Let’s look at a scenario in which a team is allowed to play a “forgotten” boule. Team A has just taken the point, leaving both teams with one unplayed boule.
- Team A turns to Team B and says “We have the point. Do you have any unplayed boules?”
- Team B (conveniently failing to remember or notice its unplayed boule) says “We’re out of boules.”
- Team A says “OK” and throws its last boule. Team A now has game on the ground.
- Team B says “Oops. I just noticed! We still have one more boule!”
- The umpire agrees to let Team B throw its “forgotten” boule.
- Team B plays its final boule. With that boule it takes the point, wins the mene, and wins the game.
Team A had the boule advantage at the beginning of this scenario, but Team B ended up throwing the last boule. How did THAT happen? It happened because Team B conveniently “forgot” its unplayed boule. This forced Team A to throw its last boule. When the dust settled and Team B was allowed to play its “forgotten” boule, Team B had the boule advantage. And it used that advantage to win the mene and the game. This clearly violates unwritten petanque General Principle #2,
The No Unfair Advantage Rule — An offending team may not benefit from its illegal action. If the offending team performs an illegal action (deliberately or not) and thereby gains some advantage, that advantage is unfair because it was gained illegally. That advantage should be removed by whatever corrective action we decide to take.
This is why a team must NOT be allowed to throw a “forgotten” boule.
How NOT to think about a forgotten boule
It is sometimes argued that a forgotten-boule situation is really a boule-thrown-out-of-turn situation. Team A, the argument goes, simply made a mistake about who should throw next, and they threw their boule out of turn. Therefore, under current FIPJP rules, play should carry on normally and Team B should throw their last boule. This is rubbish. Team A wasn’t lazy and they didn’t simply make a mistake. Team A made a genuine effort to determine if Team B had any unplayed boules, and it was actively misled by Team B.
It is sometimes argued that Team A wouldn’t have thrown their last boule if they had first counted the boules on the ground, so Team A is somehow at fault for “playing a boule out-of-turn”. It’s true that keeping a mental count of the boules played is a useful practice, but this argument is rubbish. It ignores the fact that if anyone should have been counting their boules, it was Team B, not Team A. And it ignores the fact that asking your opponents if they have any unplayed boules (and accepting their answer as truthful) is a perfectly reasonable thing to do.
Still a controversial topic
I hope that I’ve presented a clear and reasonable argument for this interpretation of the rules. Remember, however, that as of October 2023 this is still a controversial topic, and there are players and umpires who still hold that Team B should be allowed to play their last boule. For example, on October 27, 2023, international umpire Mike Pegg ruled that the player with the poor memory has the right to play his/her boule. But personally I would have a word with the player’s teammates if they were to try the same stunt more than once.
The bottom line is that there is no written FIPJP ruling on this question. (Nothing comparable, for example, to the FIPJP’s memo about boules played out-of-turn.) Players and umpires, therefore, must consider the arguments pro and con for themselves, and make their own decisions about what seems to be most reasonable, most compatible with the written FIPJP rules, and most compatible with the unwritten general principles for applying the rules.
NOT a boule played out-of-turn
In closing, I think it is important to emphasize that a forgotten boule situation is NOT the same as a boule played out-of-turn situation. In a boule played out-of-turn situation, Team A doesn’t ask Team B anything. Team A just assumes, without consultation with Team B, that it is their turn to play. Team A acts alone, and in doing so it truly is responsible for throwing a boule out-of-turn. See our post A new ruling on boules played out-of-turn.
The Rules of Petanque 