[pclayton]

Scoring: MP

(pass) - 2D - (2S) - 3D
(pass) pass (3S) double
All pass

---

Playing in a weak matchpoint field you are doubling your opponents at will. Hoping to find the round kings on your right, you take a piece out of 3♠. The sight of dummy makes you wince.

You track the ♦Q, K, Ace, 6.

Pard returns a low spade won be declarer with the Ace. Declarer plays a low heart won by the King (pard playing the 2 (udca)) and exits with a heart to pard's J and your Q.

Over to you.

[vuroth]

I'll get one of these right one of these years. In the meantime....

I'm worried that declarer's plan is:

Win return in hand
Heart, forcing out your ace
King of clubs as entry to the good T9 of hearts on the board.

I'll cash A♣ the play a low club, trying to knock out his remaining entry.

V

[han]

Nice hand Phil, here is my solution:

Spoiler

Low club seems best. Declarer has the last heart and we have to get rid of the entry to dummy. Once we get in we can play a trump, there is no hurry. Ace and another club would allow declarer to ruff a club in dummy.

[vuroth]

Good point.

Spoiler

Still, is it necessary to start with a low club? Declarer can't use the ruff entry until after he draws the last heart, so we'll still have a chance to lead trump before the hearts are run.

[pclayton]

Han is right of course. He's always right. Gets kind of old if you ask me.

I solved this at the table, but I thought declarer gave it the best chance.

[barmar]

Spoiler

Declarer doesn't need to run ♥. His shape is presumably 6=3=1=3 with solid trumps. He's lost 1 ♦ and 1 ♥, and has to lose another ♥ and ♣. The goal of the defense is to prevent him from getting rid of his other ♣ loser, which he can do either by ruffing it or setting up ♥.

If you play ♣A and another, he can ruff a ♦, ruff his last ♣, give up the ♥A and claim. If you play a trump now, he draws the last trump, knocks out the ♥A, and can eventually lead a ♣ to dummy to get rid of his last ♣ on the good ♥.

So you have to play a ♣ while you still have a trump and control of both ♥ and ♣. Declarer played as he did in the hope of finding you with ♥Ax, which would prevent you from doing this.

[han]

pclayton, on Mar 11 2008, 12:16 PM, said:

Han is right of course. He's always right.  Gets kind of old if you ask me.

What have you been reading? Shall I post links to some recent threads where I've been really stupid? I know at least 3. Congrats getting the defense right at the table. It's the kind of play that experts would like to get right every single time but it is easy to slip.