[Trumpace]

Scoring: Rubber

Contract 7♣.

West leads ♠Q.

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Plan your play in this club grand slam on the lead of spade Queen.

Adv/+ please hide your answers.

[plaur]

I have 12 tricks, need one more. I can try to ruff out a red king and if that does not work fall back on finessing the other.
PlanA: ruff out ♥K. Drop two ♥'s on spades, ruff a ♥, one round of clubs and a club to the 9 and ruff another ♥ and oooops no entry to dummy
PlanB: ruff out ♦K: Drop a ♦ on spade, two rounds of clubs, ♦A and club to 9. Drop ♦ on spade and a ruff ♦ and if the ♦K wasnt second then finesse ♥
Can I improve on PlanB by running all my clubs after ruffing the ♦? With three cards left I will have ♥AQ ♦Q in dummy and ♥98 ♣A in hand. When I run ♣A a LHO with ♥Kx ♦K will have to discard a small ♥ and the ♥K will drop. What if RHO has ♥Kx ♦K and drops a small ♥? I dont think I can read that. Since I plan to finesse anyway I gain nothing by running all clubs.

There is slightly better chance that ♦'s will be 4-2 with the Kx than the ♥'s 5-2 so PlanB it is.

[bid_em_up]

Do we know if there was any opposition bidding and if so, what was it?

(It seems like with 11 spades between them somebody would have preempted somewhere along the line).

[Trumpace]

There was no intervening bidding by opps. Also, the opps never got a chance to double hearts or diamonds as we never bid them. (I dont remember exact auction given, but I remember the above details).


plaur,

Spoiler

your solution looks right!

.

[Free]

Hidden:

Spoiler

I guess since it's posted in beginner & intermediate that one of the finesses will work... However, I'd play for a criss-cross squeeze. Take ♠A discarding a ♦, 2 rounds of trump ending in dummy, play ♠K discarding the other ♦ and run ♣ discarding your ♥QJT and 2 ♦s in dummy. You end with:
♥A
♦QJ

♥98 (QJT are gone)
♦A
Whoever has both Kings is squeezed.
Now you need to know which King was set stiff and play that Ace first. Opponents may try to misguide you, so I guess you'll need some table presence to pull this one off...

This line works in 50% of the cases. Finessing is a pure guess, which also works in 50% of the cases, but it's not as beautiful. I only lose when both finesses were on and the other players took a finesse.

[1eyedjack]

Spoiler

Discard Diamond on Spade and immediately lead Diamond, overtaking with the Ace whether or not it is covered. Assuming D:K has not appeared, draw trumps ending in dummy, now discard remaining Diamond on the other top Spade, and ruff Diamond. If the D:K still has not appeared, run all the Clubs coming down to H:AQ and D:Q. Lead final Club discarding D:Q if not by now high. If hand is still not high, finesse H:Q at trick 12.

[Free]

1eyedjack: this is a positional automatic squeeze against West which only works if the ♥K is onside. You might as well finesse ♥... It won't work against East holding both Kings.

[1eyedjack]

I make when the Heart King is on side or when the Diamond King is singleton or when the Diamond King is doubleton or when an idiot East covers a Diamond unnecessarily with the King. I reckon that is as good odds as I am going to get.

[bid_em_up]

Free, on Dec 6 2006, 06:22 AM, said:

I guess since it's posted in beginner & intermediate that one of the finesses will work...... 

so I guess you'll need some table presence to pull this one off...

This line works in 50% of the cases.  Finessing is a pure guess, which also works in 50% of the cases, but it's not as beautiful.    I only lose when both finesses were on and the other players took a finesse.

Spoiler

Free,

I agree with your analysis that your line works in 50% of the cases but I am not certain that it is the best line to take.

Look at it another way:

♥K with LHO, ♦K with RHO 25% of time, however since either finesse works, contract is 100% cold, no matter what. As long as you take either finesse or if the diamond K is doubleton in RHO's hand and ruffs out.

♦K with LHO, ♥K with RHO, 25% of the time, Nothing works, 0% chance to make, unless the diamond K is doubleton in LHO's hand, in which case it can be ruffed out.

Both Kings with LHO, 25% of the time. Your line works, but you still have to read it properly to do so. At the same time, the 50% heart finesse would have still worked, but you have eliminated the chance to be able to take this. Plus whatever percentage LHO has Kx of diamonds.

Both Kings with RHO, 25% of the time. Again your line works but you still must read it properly. But the straightforward diamond finesse would have worked equally as well along with whatever percentage Kx in RHO's hand is.

So, you have 50% on your line (which is much prettier, I agree) AND assuming you can read the position correctly (subtract at least 10%, if not more, imo).

Or you have 50% on the straightforward heart finesse, PLUS whatever the percentage of finding Kx of diamonds in EITHER hand is or the diamond Q being covered (even though it should never be). Of the two lines, I expect this one to be the overall winner.

[inquiry]

Spoiler

We have more diamonds than hearts, so I will try to drop teh diamond king first, and then, failing that, fall back on the heart finesse..

Win two top spades, pitch two diamonds. Club AK, club to 9, advance the Diamond queen. Surely no one covers unless it is doubleton. No cover, fine, I ruff and fall back on the beginners best friend, the finessee, this time in hearts. The odds of droppping a doubleton king of diamonds is better than the odds of droppiont a doubleton king of hearts If only the club 7 and 4 were reversed there would be better chances, still this is better than 50%).