[mtvesuvius]

N/E/W were GIBs. I was shown this hand by a friend of mine, and hadn't seen an ending like this before.

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He won the opening Diamond Lead in dummy, and played a diamond to hand. He then played a spade to the queen which held... Followed with a club to his hand, and a bunch of diamonds, pitching both remaining spades, a club, and a heart, and finally a club to the ace. On 5 rounds of diamonds, his RHO pitched 2♠, 2♥, 1♣. His LHO pitched a club and a heart. Then he reached this ending:

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But fell from grace when he led a heart to the ace in the four card ending. The solution is to play the ♥J from dummy, running it, followed by exiting with a club, unblocking the ♥A to endplay East.

Thought this was kind of a cool ending, was wondering if anyone has seen something similar before?

[cloa513]

mtvesuvius, on 2010-November-09, 15:59, said:

N/E/W were GIBs. I was shown this hand by a friend of mine, and hadn't seen an ending like this before.

---

He won the opening Diamond Lead in dummy, and played a diamond to hand. He then played a spade to the queen which held... Followed with a club to his hand, and a bunch of diamonds, pitching both remaining spades, a club, and a heart, and finally a club to the ace. On 5 rounds of diamonds, his RHO pitched 2♠, 2♥, 1♣. His LHO pitched a club and a heart. Then he reached this ending:

---

But fell from grace when he led a heart to the ace in the four card ending. The solution is to play the ♥J from dummy, running it, followed by exiting with a club, unblocking the ♥A to endplay East.

Thought this was kind of a cool ending, was wondering if anyone has seen something similar before?

Nice. An unblocking endplay.
If you think that's cool try this one, can't rememeber the full hands. After a rather strange bidding sequence 1D, X, 2NT,pass,3C,.... EW reach 4S play the spades for one loser.

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You can guess how to play without seeing all four cards it if you assume North has most of HCP (13) and a flattish hand so finesse the hearts to see North has 2 hearts (assuming he isn't falsecarding but he probably drop the K first round if falsecarding) and 3 Spades assume spades are split South has have some HCP. Then reverse finesse playing the 8 of spades if defender plays low or high if Jack then forward finesse. Declarers didn't see it the solution and played spades first and and lost two spades.

[655321]

Cloa the play on your hand is called an intrafinesse.

[cloa513]

655321, on 2010-November-09, 19:06, said:

Cloa the play on your hand is called an intrafinesse.

Thanks- That's a good name though its a reverse intrafinesse like leading to A10987 from Qxxx to split honours. Indeed if South ducks then the next play is smother finesse.

[matmat]

655321, on 2010-November-09, 19:06, said:

Cloa the play on your hand is called an intrafinesse.

Or a basic endplay. Obviously the lead is in the west hand, so i just finesse hearts and play a third round of the suit.

[mtvesuvius]

matmat, on 2010-November-09, 19:25, said:

Or a basic endplay. Obviously the lead is in the west hand, so i just finesse hearts and play a third round of the suit.

Except that N has 5 Cards, S has 6 Cards, W has 7 Cards and East has 8 Cards. It's called a director call.

[matmat]

mtvesuvius, on 2010-November-09, 19:29, said:

Except that N has 5 Cards, S has 6 Cards, W has 7 Cards and East has 8 Cards. It's called a director call.

This is why I will never be any good at bridge. I never learned to count.

[mtvesuvius]

matmat, on 2010-November-09, 19:30, said:

This is why I will never be any good at bridge. I never learned to count.

Me neither, when I first looked, I didn't see anything wrong either.

So we hook the heart, and exit a heart, and OOOOOPPPS... Director.

[mohitz]

Nice. I hadn't seen this before. Thanks for sharing.