[Echognome]

Scoring: IMP

(P) - 1♥ - (3♦) - 4♣
(P) - 4♥ - (P) - 4♠
(P) - 5♣ - (P) - 5NT
(P) - 6♣ - All Pass

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You and your partner were exuberant in the bidding, but you are not down yet.

Lead is the ♦8. You win the ace and play a club to your K which holds.

Now what?

Note: I assume you will have some problems with the bidding, but it is included for whatever inferences you want to take from the defense.

[RichMor]

Since you included the Club 8, could you also mention the spot cards played on the first round ?

[kfay]

I play righty to hold 7 diamonds.

[jdonn]

kfay, on Jan 2 2009, 04:19 PM, said:

I play righty to hold 7 diamonds.

I think the question is who do you play for three clubs? If you use the king of spades to lead another club then you will have to take your heart discard while in dummy, and go down by a diamond promotion if LHO has three clubs. But you could solve that at trick 3 by leading a low club from hand.

It's a tough call. LHO obviously would be the one to play for club length since his partner preempted, but RHO might have just six diamonds in which case I'm lowering my chances in the club suit to accomplish nothing. I think I would play the low club from hand right now since six diamonds seems unlikely on such a bad suit.

[rogerclee]

low club, thought this was really clear

[cherdano]

They are white vs red, so a 6-card suit is still possible (depending on RHO, of course). Also, I think RHO is more likely to duck holding AJx or ATx rather than Ax. I think I would cross to dummy etc.

[kfay]

jdonn, on Jan 2 2009, 04:23 PM, said:

kfay, on Jan 2 2009, 04:19 PM, said:

I play righty to hold 7 diamonds.

I think the question is who do you play for three clubs? If you use the king of spades to lead another club then you will have to take your heart discard while in dummy, and go down by a diamond promotion if LHO has three clubs. But you could solve that at trick 3 by leading a low club from hand.

It's a tough call. LHO obviously would be the one to play for club length since his partner preempted, but RHO might have just six diamonds in which case I'm lowering my chances in the club suit to accomplish nothing. I think I would play the low club from hand right now since six diamonds seems unlikely on such a bad suit.

aha. yeah i totally didn't think about the promotion. sure a 6-card suit is possible but with such a poor holding i'd be more prone to play RHO for 7. low club now

[manudude03]

Playing RHO for something like xx x QTxxxxx Axx. So I'm being boring and playing spade to the King, King of diamonds pitching a heart and small club to the queen.

[gnasher]

It depends on how aggressive a preempter RHO is.

If I think he's likely to have seven diamonds, he's more likely to have ♣Ax than Axx, so I lead a low club back.

If I think RHO would be happy to preempt on Q109xxx and a couple of side honours, it's best to play a spade to dummy, cash the diamond, and lead another trump. A priori, xx63 is more likely than xx72.

[Echognome]

At the table, RHO held Ax and popped A to return a diamond. However, we thought it a more difficult problem if she had ducked the first club. Well done to most of you!