[Phil]

♠Q98
♥T97642
♦J74
♣3

1♣ - 1♦
3♣ - 4N
5♦ - 6♣

Your lead.

[hanp]

Spade seems canonical.

[whereagles]

Spade, yes.

[Apollo81]

agree with the spade lead

usually it's right to choose the aggressive option against a small suit slam

[ArtK78]

I would lead a spade at IMPs without hesitation. At matchpoints or BAM, I would consider the possibility of giving up an overtrick on a spade lead. The OP did not specify the form of scoring.

[Phil]

Sorry, I had to conduct this poll to show someone that a spade is clear.

He led a heart at the table. Pard had ♠AJx over dummy's K.

[hanp]

From recent posts it seems both you and that someone would do better making the straightforward leads. A good lesson to remember?

A well known forum poster once told me he had been displeased with his opening leads and had gone through hundreds (thousands?) of deals to try to improve them. I asked him if he had learned any lessons that he could pass along to me. He laughed and said that he learned conventional wisdom is often pretty good.

[Hanoi5]

How is a spade canonical? What's the thought process behind it?

[hatchett]

The idea is you lead from aggressively from a K or Q against a small slam to try and set up a trick, which can they be cashed if one of the defending side has an ace.

[Codo]

Your thoughts must be something like this:

1. Do I need to develop quick tricks or is the main goal not to blow a trick on lead?

2. When you decide that the later is the case, you lead as passive as possible.
But normaly you have no clear sign for a passive lead. In this case it is better to lead active. OF course now you still gift the contract sometimes. In the given example f.e it is totally possible that declarer has Spade AKJ and your lead gives him his 12. trick. But it is much more likely that they have enough tricks anyway, so that losers in this suit can be discarded on a long side suit.
And in this case you need to attack for your tricks as quick as possible.
And the only suit where you have at least a little help to develop a trick is spades.
Any other lead is at least passive.

[Phil]

hanp, on Mar 17 2009, 10:25 PM, said:

From recent posts it seems both you and that someone would do better making the straightforward leads. A good lesson to remember?

A spade didn't even occur to him here. He thought Qxx was a horrible holding to lead from.

[keylime]

I'm in the spade crowd too - leading a heart is incredibly passive against this snappy slam. Hell, I'd lead the Q!

[Hanoi5]

Quote

Your thoughts must be something like this:

1. Do I need to develop quick tricks or is the main goal not to blow a trick on lead?

2. When you decide that the later is the case, you lead as passive as possible.
But normaly you have no clear sign for a passive lead. In this case it is better to lead active. OF course now you still gift the contract sometimes. In the given example f.e it is totally possible that declarer has Spade AKJ and your lead gives him his 12. trick. But it is much more likely that they have enough tricks anyway, so that losers in this suit can be discarded on a long side suit.
And in this case you need to attack for your tricks as quick as possible.
And the only suit where you have at least a little help to develop a trick is spades.
Any other lead is at least passive.

I understand this logic when you have a sure trick. But I guess in this case you just imagine that your partner has an Ace (because they didn't keep trying for seven?) and lead 'for' him. Am I right?

I'm just trying to compare this situation to Frances' Poll. I chose a spade lead there and a heart lead here. I know both were sort of passive but I wasn't sure about the thought process behind them.

[mikeh]

Hanoi5, on Mar 18 2009, 10:05 AM, said:

Quote

Your thoughts must be something like this:

1. Do I need to develop quick tricks or is the main goal not to blow a trick on lead?

2. When you decide that the later is the case, you lead as passive as possible.
But normaly you have no clear sign for a passive lead. In this case it is better to lead active. OF course now you still gift the contract sometimes. In the given example f.e it is totally possible that declarer has Spade AKJ and your lead gives him his 12. trick. But it is much more likely that they have enough tricks anyway, so that losers in this suit can be discarded on a long side suit.
And in this case you need to attack for your tricks as quick as possible.
And the only suit where you have at least a little help to develop a trick is spades.
Any other lead is at least passive.

I understand this logic when you have a sure trick. But I guess in this case you just imagine that your partner has an Ace (because they didn't keep trying for seven?) and lead 'for' him. Am I right?

I'm just trying to compare this situation to Frances' Poll. I chose a spade lead there and a heart lead here. I know both were sort of passive but I wasn't sure about the thought process behind them.

Obviously, much depends on the form of scoring and the sound of the auction, in the context of one's hand.

But, if the opps have bid to a 12 trick contract at imps, you don't care about giving away an overtrick... you want to set the opps.

If you can see a potential set in your hand, maybe because your hand makes it clear that you probably hold all of your side's assets, then you will usually want to go passive unless your holding in a suit is self-sufficient (e.g. KQJ).

It is more common, however, for you to hold a little something, as here... you hold the Qxx in an unbid suit.

You cannot possibly set this contract without help... you have to assume that partner has some values as well, but he won't have a lot, given the auction.

Say he has the heart King.... well, if declarer has the Ace, the King is no good, because your hearts don't add to its strength. But if he has the spade K, then your Queen makes the King worth a trick, assuming the opps don't have shortness.

In addition, unless we are cashing winners off the top (which we won't do very often against competent opps) our goal may be to set up a second trick to go along with, for example, our trump trick. Again, leading a heart won't be as effective as a spade.. givne partner the heart King and 50% of the time, we simply pick it off. Give him the spade K, and our spade lead establishes our Queen wherever the A sits.

The same principle arises in many situations: on lead against a 3N when we have Qxx xxx xxxx xxx, and the auction went 1N 3N, we lead a spade, not a heart, because we need to hit partner's suit, and we are guessing which it is, but we choose spades because we offer some help there.. if partner has AJ10xx in either major, leading hearts may do nothing at all, but leading spades will establish 4 winners immediately.

With Q10xx xxx KJx Qxx, and the auction 2N 6N with us on lead, we'd choose the top heart because we can expect partner to hold nothing, and a lead away from any honour is likely to cost a trick.

[jdonn]

Phil, on Mar 18 2009, 09:23 AM, said:

hanp, on Mar 17 2009, 10:25 PM, said:

From recent posts it seems both you and that someone would do better making the straightforward leads. A good lesson to remember?

A spade didn't even occur to him here. He thought Qxx was a horrible holding to lead from.

I agree that the problem here is to learn in the first place that a spade is the normal lead, not to make normal leads.

[skjaeran]

I always make active leads vs small slams, unless the bidding strongly indicate going passive. So I'd not think twice about leading a spade here.