[pclayton]

You are playing BAM against two of the best young Canadian players.

Scoring: BAM

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You open 1♣ (white on red) and LHO comes in with 2♠ preemptive. Pard makes a negative double and RHO bounces to 4♠. You take the push to 5♣ and RHO doubles.

The opening lead is the ♠Q. You win in hand. You bought a pretty good dummy here. How do you continue?

[mikegill]

RHO only has 3 trumps here, so he must have a good hand to think he has play for making 4S (why else would he bid it at unfavorable?). Probably he has a stiff club and is something like Kxx Axxx AKJxx x, and LHO is QJTxxx xx xx xxx. This is consistent with the fact that LHO didn't lead a singleton. It's possible that LHO has one of RHO's outside pictures. If this is what's going on, it seems best to ruff spade, club to A, ruff spade, then give up a diamond, which guarantees me a way back if diamonds aren't 6-1 (which seems less likely than hearts being 6-1).

[mikeh]

I agree with ruffing a ♠, crossing in trump and ruffing a ♠, then a ♦.

Exiting a ♦ before ruffing a ♠ looks tempting, but say LHO rises with K and continues a low ♦? Now his possible Jxx in trump grows up if he held QJ10xxx xx Kx Jxx.... a more plausible 2♠ than QJ10xxx xx xx Jxx at this heat. This construction gives RHO Kxx A109x AJxxx x: more than enough for the auction, including the double, since he thinks we may be saving.

I don't think we can cater to Jxxx of trump on our right (and we sure can't cater to it on our left) and even at BAM, this is a contract we play to make, since there is no risk of going down more than the value of their game.

[dank]

Muah. muahahaha.

[Fluffy]

What about ruff a spade then exit with a diamond?

[pclayton]

Dr. Evil rears his head.

A paranoia set in that trump might have been 4-0. I wanted to have the luxury of testing with a high trump and ruffing 2 spades. But communications kind of sucked, so I played a ♦ at T2. RHO (Dr. E) wins the KING and taps dummy with a spade.

So the fear that trump were 4-0 is becoming more real. I ruff a diamond, and RHO pops Ace. Well I don't think he has AK - tight, but its barely possibly, especially since DRG on my left is preempting at adverse with a 6 card suit, and we all know what kind of standards 20-somethings have for their preempts .

Reconstructing a little at this point: LHO has 6 spades and 3-4 diamonds. He doesn't have a stiff heart and xx of clubs (else he would lead the stiff). So LHO is 6=2=3=2, 6=3=3=1, 6=3=4=0 or the like.

I continue by ruffing a spade, and I need to get off the board. Here I make an error; if I truly think its possible dank has J-4th of clubs, I should ruff the 3rd diamond now (known to be safe, since RHO won the AK♦, so the Jack is on my left). But I play a low heart toward my hand instead, since I'm expecting the ♥A to be on my right for the x. But LHO wins and fires back a heart and I'm in dummy.

No problem, ruff a diamond, cash a high club to check the break. If they are 4-0, I can cash hearts and play a diamond off the board and pick up Dan's trump.

I win the heart on the board, play a diamond, ruff, OVERRUFF! Dan was jokering me all the time with AKJxx of diamonds! The entire hand:

Scoring: BAM

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