[Gerben42]

♠J3
♥KT4
♦A8743
♣Q92

Auction 1♠ p 4♠*

* Opening strength 3+♠ (don't ask...)

To make things worse, your agreed opening lead style is Polish, i.e. 2nd and 4th, low from small doubleton.

Scoring: MP
Opponents: No good

[P_Marlowe]

scoring format?

MP: Trump, passive
IMP: Heart, aggressive

With kind regards
Marlowe

[Free]

small ♦, apparently it's the 4...

[dogsbreath]

hi
looks to me like a passive lead not only inadequate but hard to determine what is passive!.... if i chose to attack it will be Q♣ ..p doesnt rate to have much and this may protect our club holding .. additionally, as i seem to hold the entries it's possible we find a club ruff if p has the 'magic' Jx holding.
I have to admit i might not actually lead this at the table )

Rgds Dog

[ArcLight]

I find this a difficult problem.

It sounds like pard has at most 5 HCP and could be as few as 2. I think with 0 they might bid more.

Im guessing Trumps are 5-3. If Dummy has 4 trumps with 13 HCP and bids 4S they will miss many slams, unless its a 4-3-3-3 quackish hand.

I'd like to make a passive lead, but I dont see any.
Leading a club or heart can easily give away a trick. Sma efor a Spade as it doesn't sound like they need ruffs.

We want to avoid giving away tricks. If they have the K and Q of dimes plus all their other values we sont set the contract, so aim to score as many tricks as possible.


Because both N and S have many HCP the prohibition of underleading aces is somewhat lifted.
If we underlead the Ace ♦ and Dummy ahs the K and ducks to pards Q and he returns the suit, we may get a 3rd round ruff. That requires both opps be 3-3 in Diamonds.
I don't think thats likely, but we may still score pards Q and our ace and another trick and get a good score holding them to 4.

For the Ace underlead to cost the opps must have a doubleton diamond, win the first trick, and be able to discard a diamond later.


The alternative is Ace and another ♦.

GOOD opps would ask themselves why you are making that lead and suspect you have the missing honors.


I lead the Ace♦ and am prepared for it to be a bad lead. But I think all other leads will be more likely to be bad.

[mike777]

Whatever the correct lower heart is.
Must admit I would not have given any other lead a thought.

[temp3600]

♥4

[adhoc3]

♥ 4, auto. Dont know polish thing.

[Gerben42]

Quote

♥ 4, auto. Dont know polish thing

I am just stating the agreements. You may of course deviate from those agreements.

[adhoc3]

Lead ♥10 seems... oddness to me, not sure about the meaning

BTW, 'auto' means I dont know where to start, so get to the lazy way

[bid_em_up]

When in doubt, lead a club (if not leading a trump). Its like Rodney Dangerfield, it gets no respect.

Since I have an honor in the suit, and I (probably) wish for partner to continue this line of attack, I will lead the 2 pretending I have 4, instead of the 9, showing no interest in the suit.

[Gerben42]

At least no one led ♥K, everything else was chosen at least once so far. Keep voting!

[luke warm]

♠3

[Gerben42]

In the actual hand:

Spoiler

Heart and Club cost a trick and lead to an overtrick.

Spades and Ace of Diamonds are neutral and lead to just making.

A small Diamonds leads to 1 down as declarer will misguess the situation (unless you think for it for ages, then declarer might go right with Kx in dummy and Jx in hand...)