[paulg]

Scoring: IMP

2NT 3♣
3♥ 4♥
4NT 5♦
6♥

Lead: ♠2,won by East's ♠A, who switches to a trump

---

How do you play the hand?

When you lead a second trump, West shows out.

[finally17]

The more important question I would be asking is why are we in 6♥ and not 4? If I were dummy I would be very perturbed with partner.

[pclayton]

finally17, on Dec 15 2007, 07:03 AM, said:

The more important question I would be asking is why are we in 6♥ and not 4?  If I were dummy I would be very perturbed with partner.

It's an unusual auction to say the least but there's nothing wrong with this slam. It's practically cold on 3-2 hearts and non-4-0 clubs.

There are some nice themes to this hand to work out.

[gwnn]

I agree - I think these kinds of auctions should never be posted in the BI forum.

[finally17]

pclayton, on Dec 15 2007, 10:16 AM, said:

finally17, on Dec 15 2007, 07:03 AM, said:

The more important question I would be asking is why are we in 6♥ and not 4?  If I were dummy I would be very perturbed with partner.

It's an unusual auction to say the least but there's nothing wrong with this slam. It's practically cold on 3-2 hearts and non-4-0 clubs.

There are some nice themes to this hand to work out.

No, there's not. But still. I went into detail before I realized where it was posted, and then decided I'm not acquainted enough with the BI forum to know how much detail I should use, so I edited.

[paulg]

Jeez, there's a real lack of B/I play problems and all people care about is the bidding? Who cares what the bidding was except that the opposition did not bid and (hint) South is declarer.

[han]

Agree with Paul, this is a very good B/I problem.

[Trumpace]

Yes, this is an instructive hand.

And what is wrong with giving wrong bidding? As long as someone points out why the bidding is wrong etc, it is only helping B/I. I have seen plenty B/I who bid the same values again and again.

In this case I think I know why Paul gave this bidding instead of trying out some normal course to 6H

[ArtK78]

As for the play (and that is the question that was asked) I don't understand the play of a second trump (maybe a second trump was not played - the problem just says that WHEN you play the second round of trump, West shows out).

This hand should be easy if spades are not 7-1 and clubs are not 4-0.

Win the trump return in hand, cash the spade, cross in trump, ruff a spade, pull trump (pitching your losing diamond on the last trump) and run the clubs. Normally you should be careful to unblock the 987 of clubs when you run the clubs, but since you still have the DA, that precaution is unnecessary.

I don't see anything else to this hand.

If you play a second round of trump and find trump are 4-1, you can't reach dummy to ruff a spade and then get back to dummy to pull trump after ruffing a spade.

I don't see anyway to cater to 4-0 clubs while taking care to make 12 tricks on most lies of the cards.

[finally17]

cardsharp, on Dec 15 2007, 11:16 AM, said:

Jeez, there's a real lack of B/I play problems and all people care about is the bidding? Who cares what the bidding was except that the opposition did not bid and (hint) South is declarer.

My fault.

Relatively new to the (various) forums. However, it's exactly because it's the BI forum that I said something.

If bad bidding is going to be included it should be for a reason. The fact that it's there implied to me that someone should comment that it's not great, because I wouldn't want to encourage noobs in any of the mistakes exhibited there. And like I said, I wasn't clear what kind of level I should (not) go into...so best to wait and let someone else ask and answer.

As to the play, agreed it's a good problem.

[vuroth]

ArtK78, on Dec 15 2007, 04:00 PM, said:

This hand should be easy if spades are not 7-1 and clubs are not 4-0.

I see that. I don't see any way to handle a 4-0 club split, though.

If the opponent with 4 clubs does not have the long trump, letting them in early allows them to set the contract on a ruff. If the opponent with 4 clubs DOES have the long trump, they can't be endplayed, as they can exit trump and make me break clubs.

If I absolutely knew that clubs were 4-0 I could try to entice east to cover the T9♠ when I led towards the queen, but given my first discard that seems anti-percentage.

V

[Walddk]

Not only is it a good play problem in this forum, it is also an excellent auction in the sense that I suspect a few would bid the hand like this.

The bidding is not great, but how many of you have flawless auctions all the time? The important issue is that there is nothing wrong with the contract, so to finally17 I would suggest that you try to make it instead of complaining about why you are in slam instead of game.

Roland

[paulg]

sceptic, on Dec 18 2007, 02:59 AM, said:

Quote

Win the trump return in hand, cash the spade, cross in trump, ruff a spade, pull trump

thats all I can see then hope the clubs split well, I can't see how to do anything else

The real question is whether you would have seen this if the solution had not been posted by a non-BI player.

This is a simple hand. You just need to ruff a spade in the closed hand.

However dummy reversals can be tough to spot when one hand is very strong, and that hand is playing the contract. In this case, if declarer just looks at his own hand it seems impossible to see where the diamond can be thrown, it is just unnatural to consider discarding it on a trump.

So a number of people at Peebles failed this test in the Swiss Teams, just having a simple blind spot.

There is a simple solution, that all players can use, to help with this type of problem - count the losers in both hands.

This hand will probably reappear in my BIL sessions next year

Paul

[barmar]

Actually, this is really a case of counting WINNERs. We're so accustomed to counting losers in trump contracts. Dummy reversals and elopement plays require slightly different thinking.

In this case, your winners are 5 ♣, 1 ♠, 1♦, 4 trumps, and 1 ♠ ruff.

[vuroth]

I'll admit, I'm surprised that this was a problem for so many people.

Given how bad I usually am at the intermediate play puzzles, I found this one surprisingly easy. Guess I have different blind spots than other people, that's all.

V