[leboulepat]

♠97
♥A10xxx
♦KJ
♣J10xx



2♠ p 2NT p
3♠ p 6♠ p


2♠ is weak, 3♠ is maxi Honors and points.

What is your lead ?

[P_Marlowe]

English notation for the cards would be great ...
I think you did use a notation used in the netherland?

Marlowe

[Gerben42]

No it's French. If you think that's confusing, know that V is Jack (Valet) in France and V is Queen (Vrouw) in the Netherlands. What V is in Brussels, where both languages are spoken, who knows...

Anyway, here is the hand:

---

[joker_gib]

Gerben42, on Dec 16 2005, 11:39 AM, said:

What V is in Brussels, where both languages are spoken, who knows...

It's J cause we're playing with English cards at national level !

[joker_gib]

Small ♥

[Gerben42]

I lead a trump btw.

[whereagles]

Looking at my hand, I don't think opps will be able to setup any suit, so I lead a trump. Expecting -2

[Robert]

Hi whereagles

Unless NS are crazy or beginners, I would expect a long club suit to appear in dummy and it will be set up with one ruff.

Any decent bidders will probably make 6Ss by winning 6 spades, 1-2 hearts,
4-5 clubs plus the diamond Ace. If you make more than the heart Ace I would be very surprised.

Axx KQ Ax AKQxxx opposite KQJxxx Jx Qx xx 6S, 1D and 5C

Axx KQx Ax AKQxx opposite KQJxxx Jx Qx xx 6S, 1H, 1D and 4C

The bidding is not very good, so you might set this one.

Your hand does suggest that the cards appear to be very favorably located for them because their black suits should have 19 of the 20 HCP 'black' HCP and any 5+ club suit should easily make slam.

Regards,
Robert

[FrancesHinden]

Simply saying that slam is likely to make it not very helpful, as it rather ruins the point of the lead problem!

I agree dummy very likely has a long side suit. It's probably clubs, although it could be diamonds (or even hearts). I can see three ways to beat this:

a) attack dummy's outside entry. For this, our doubleton trump is very bad news as there may be a late re-entry anyway.
set up a trick in a side suit before he has 12. Our holding the ace of hearts makes that rather less likely, unless dummy's side suit is hearts. Perhaps something like Qx x Axx AKQxxxx in dummy opposite declarer's singleton club in hand.
c) take two heart tricks when dummy has the King and declarer the Jack.

c) needs a low heart lead.
a) and both need with a diamond lead. The HA is probably cashing, but may set up the K or KQ in dummy as an entry/diamond discard.

I think a diamond lead is percentage, though I'm not very confident about this. If I lead a diamond, of course it must be the king. You'd feel deserving of an award if this was the fully hand:

Qx
x
Axx
AKQxxxx


AKJxxx
xxx
Qxx
x

(though declarer would probably go off on the DJ lead)

[P_Marlowe]

Hi

Jack of Clubs, because we will need to develop
our 2nd trick fast.

Most likely the 6S bidder is void,
... and we know which suit.

If you trust this analysis, you could lead
the Ace of heart, at least the Ace is safer
than a low heart, but opener may hold the
King.

With kind regards
Marlowe

[pclayton]

KD. For the same reasons as Frances.

Also, the fact that LHO didn't cue leads me to believe there is a red suit void and an open red suit.

Although I don't buy Frances hand of: Qx, x, Axx, AKQxxxx, because LHO should be placing the hand in 6C.

My suit lengths tell me that LHO could hold: Qxxx, void, xx (x), AKQxxx (x).

[Winstonm]

What stopped the big hand from using an Ace ask? Only hand that makes sense to me is something like:

KJx, x, AQ109xx, AKx

This hand must be missing either the heart Ace or diamond King but slam in on no worse than the finesse.

I think I'll try to encourage the wrong view with the J diamonds lead and hope for a singleton diamond in declarer's hand.

Winston

[mikeh]

I like Frances' construction: while I recognize that some would play in 6♣ on that hand, many would opt for the higher scoring major, especially since many layouts that beat 6♠ also beat 6♣: see this hand as an example. Yes, I know that there are hands on which 6♣ can make and 6♠ fail.

I lead the ♦K against a disciplined or unknown responder and the ♥A against a known gambler.

The gambler might be blasting with Kx xx AQ AKQxxxx as an example, knowing that partner cannot hold the cards for grand and that keycard would do him no good: he cannot tell about the ♥ situation when partner shows the inevitable 1 keycard response: he gambles that partner has second round control or that we do not find the lead: and the second part of the gamble would prevail against most of the posters here.

BTW, it might be useful to know if they would treat 4♥ over 3♠ as an asking bid, as I do in my serious partnerships. If so, then I would lead the ♦K against all opps, since even blasters will sometimes use science to avoid a terrible result.

[mikeh]

Winstonm, on Dec 16 2005, 12:42 PM, said:

What stopped the big hand from using an Ace ask?  Only hand that makes sense to me is something like:

KJx, x, AQ109xx, AKx

This hand must be missing either the heart Ace or diamond King but slam in on no worse than the finesse.

I think I'll try to encourage the wrong view with the J diamonds lead and hope for a singleton diamond in declarer's hand.

Winston

That won't work against your construction. Declarer has lots of time to draw two rounds of trump and ruff a small ♦ before taking the ruffing hook. And my guess is that you (and all of us) would have taken some time before leading the ♦J, which almost definitively rules out a singleton.

[mike777]

leboulepat, on Dec 16 2005, 05:28 AM, said:

♠97
♥A10xxx
♦KJ
♣J10xx



2♠ p 2NT p
3♠ p 6♠ p


2♠ is weak, 3♠ is maxi Honors and points.

What is your lead ?

Ace of hearts

simple lead for a simple soul

[Winstonm]

mikeh, on Dec 16 2005, 12:48 PM, said:

Winstonm, on Dec 16 2005, 12:42 PM, said:

What stopped the big hand from using an Ace ask?  Only hand that makes sense to me is something like:

KJx, x, AQ109xx, AKx

This hand must be missing either the heart Ace or diamond King but slam in on no worse than the finesse.

I think I'll try to encourage the wrong view with the J diamonds lead and hope for a singleton diamond in declarer's hand.

Winston

That won't work against your construction. Declarer has lots of time to draw two rounds of trump and ruff a small ♦ before taking the ruffing hook. And my guess is that you (and all of us) would have taken some time before leading the ♦J, which almost definitively rules out a singleton.

This is true....but at times declarer will simply assume the King location without employing correct technique. And if declarer is short of entries, say with a holding like:

Kx, x, AQ109xxx, AKx

Or this:

Kx, x, AQx, AKQxxxx

The diamond Jack puts the pressure on at trick one to take the right view...and besides, I always find the killing lead really fast.....

Winston

[Fluffy]

There are 2 leads IMO: low ♥ to force an inmediate guess if they have the right cards or ♦ to kill dummie's entry. I'll go for the low ♥

[Kalvan14]

♦J. But a case might be made for A♥ (my 2nd choice)

[FrancesHinden]

mikeh, on Dec 16 2005, 12:45 PM, said:

I lead the ♦K against a disciplined or unknown responder and the ♥A against a known gambler.

This is a good point. There are certainly some people I know against whom two hearts could easily be cashing. Although if I do lead a heart I think I very slightly prefer a low one. I don't think we have the ace of hearts to cash and a slow trick elsewhere (when starting with the ace is better).

I don't buy the argument that says LHO can't have particular types of hand because he would have used Blackwood. If opener has shown good trumps, for many people that would deny an ace outside the trump suit as it would then be a 1-level opening, so what would then be the point of Blackwood?