[Fluffy]

Scoring: IMP

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1♣-1♥
1NT-2♠
3♥-3♠
4♣-4♦
4♠-4NT
5♦-6♥

Lead is ♦10 (east will play the king)

[pclayton]

Start cashing clubs. Its only patently wrong if clubs are 5-1. If LHO biffs the 3rd club you can fall back on the heart hook.

If RHO trumps the 3rd club, its probably correct to pitch and use your spade entry to hook hearts and not monkey around with any more clubs. This pays off when trumps are 4-1 to the right.

Even if you could divine that RHO held 1=2 in the rounded's, you are going to run into communication problems when LHO gets in with the ♥K.

[FrancesHinden]

I agree it feels right to start on clubs.

But it's an interesting question what to do if RHO ruffs the third club with the non-king. I don't see how discarding is any better than over-ruffing and crossing in spades to take the heart finesse, if RHO has Kxxx in hearts we make an overtrick and we don't go off any more often. Instead, I think it's right to over-ruff and then do one of 4 things:

- cross in spades and play another club
- cash the ace of hearts, cross in spades and play another club
- cross in spades and take the heart finesse
- try cashing four rounds of spades

The last doesn't feel right, but the others are interesting.

The first picks up xxxx, x, Kx and Kxx hearts on our right
The second picks up xxxx, x, xx, Kx and Kxx hearts on our right (that makes the second better than the first)
The third picks up Kx, Kxx and Kxxx on our right.

The difference is 4 Kxxx holdings vs. 1 xxxx, 4 x and 6 xx holdings

If RHO has a doubleton club he's more likely to have longer trumps, but I'm not convinced the difference is enough.

I'm going to run clubs. If RHO ruffs, I over-ruff, cash the ace of hearts, cross in spades and play more clubs.

(This is better than cashing the ace of hearts first, which loses everytime RHO Has the HK and LHO the club shortage)

[Fluffy]

you can also pick xxx of hearts in your right when the layout is as it was:

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After ♥A and 2 ruffs from East, only trump King is remaining, and that's the card that must ruff 4th spade while you discard the diamond.

[gwnn]

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