[Stephen Tu]

Scoring: MP

Bidding: 1♣-1♦-1nt(1)-3nt
(1) 15-17

---

West leads a small heart

I thought this was a neat hand. Try without software help!

(1) If south guesses the spades, how many tricks should be made?

Bonus questions:
(2) In a vacuum (not considering the contract/lead/rest of the hand), what's the best way to play the spade suit?

(3) Is there a reason South should guess the spades right on this hand?

[manudude03]

1. If I had to guess, I would say 12 tricks. Duck the opening lead, When you get in, finesse the ♠J, cash ♥AK, ♣A and run the diamonds pitching the 2 clubs. On the last diamond, west gets squeezed in the majors.

I don't think the threats are in the right hands for a triple squeeze to operate (west can unguard spades and come to a club trick in the end).

2. I would say the right way of playing it is as shown. It ensures you don't block the suit and you get 4 tricks if LHO has the Q to no more than 3. If you hook the other way and RHO had Qx (or if you ran the jack, LHO would get a trick with 98xx), the suit would be blocked and you would have to use entries to enjoy the winners.

3. Its a near 50-50 guess. Your only slightly subtle hint I suppose would be the fact RHO didn't double 1♦, but its not something I would read much into given the combined strength of the 2 hands.

[ArtK78]

There is a triple squeeze for all of the tricks.

Win the opening lead, play a spade to the J, and run the diamonds, pitching the ♥10 and a low club from hand. What does West pitch in this position at trick 7:

Q8x
Q9
--
Kx

If he pitches a club, declarer cashes the ♣A, crosses in hearts and plays the ♣Q. West is squeezed in the majors.

If he pitches a heart, dummy's hearts are good and declarer has 13 tricks.

If he pitches a spade, declarer runs spades, resulting in West having to pitch from this hand at trick 10:

--
Qx
--
Kx

If he pitches a club, declarer plays a club to dummy, a heart to hand and wins trick 13 with the ♣Q.

If he pitches a heart, declarer cashes the ♥A and crosses to dummy in clubs to win trick 13 with the ♥8.

Please check this, but I believe it is correct.

[gnasher]

Very nice: a triple squeeze where one variation is a criss-cross.

The best way to play spades in isolation is low to the jack, which picks up Q6xx on the left. Everything else is symmetrical.

On the actual hand, if I take a losing spade finesse I won't make more than 11 tricks - they can break up any squeeze by playing a club. Instead, I'd hope to take a successful spade finesse and then squeeze or endplay someone for an extra trick.

My basic plan is to cash two diamonds and then decide who to play for ♠Q, either playing a spade to the jack or ace and a low one to the ten.

If I take a winning spade finesse against West and the queen doesn't fall under the ace, I'll have to guess how many he has. If he has Qxx, I should cash the remaining pointed-suit winners, hoping for the criss-cross for 13. If I think he has Qxxx, I should cash ♣A before the top spades, then endplay him with his spade winner to lead into my heart tenace.

If I take a winning finesse against East, I have to guess who has ♣K. If West has it, play the rest of the diamonds followed by four rounds of spades, squeezing West in the round suits (regardless of whether I'm winning this spade trick or East is). If East has♣K and ♠Qxxx, I should duck a heart whilst I still have communication in spades and diamonds, then squeeze East in the blacks.

However, when East has ♠Qx or ♠Qxx, the play of ♠Q on the second round will prevent my cashing the spade and diamond winners to squeeze West. This complication doesn't arise if I play West for ♠Q, so I think I'll do that.

[Stephen Tu]

Good analysis by Art & gnasher, except

Quote

The best way to play spades in isolation is low to the jack, which picks up Q6xx on the left. Everything else is symmetrical.

This is not correct. If you assume that you are going to try to pick up the 98 doubleton on the right, then consider the effect of East playing the 9 or 8 from 9xx/8xx/98xx under the J. Meanwhile ace then J works perfectly fine with 98 doubleton on the left, or indeed any 9x/8x.

Also there are tons of asymmetries. If you play SA, and east drops 8/9, you are supposed to lead low from dummy to cater to Q8/Q9 doubleton. But otherwise you should lead J. So while the first round hook picks up all Qx/q9/q8 doubleton on the left, Ace first doesn't pick up Qx on the right. And after the ace, if the J is covered and the 8/9 falls on your left, you should hook next round. So first round hook picks up all the Q third onside, but ace then J sacrifices 98x offside in order to pick up the 9x/8x combos.

Also first round ace caters to singleton Q in either hand while first round hook does not. It also caters to singleton 9/8 with west.

So if you toss out the symmetrical positions, it basically boils down to
(98x, 98xx on the right) vs. (stiff Q on right, 9/8/98/9x/8x on the left)

In isolation, SA first is best by about 4.76%
(manudude, "in a vacuum" means you don't worry about blockages, you assume enough entries to each hand)

Of course on the actual hand there are a ton of other considerations, I'm still not sure what's best.