[vuroth]

I love defense problems. I love them about a million times more than I love reading bidding books, which is probably why I deveour defense books in a week, but Thurston has taken me more than a month.

Here's a hand from last night. I can't decide if I'm resulting, or if there's a clear right answer.

I'm sitting west and dealer:
P 1♠ P 2♣
P 2♥ P 2NT
P 3NT all pass

Scoring: MP

---

I lead the 6♦. This isn't the point of the question, but I wasn't sure at the time and am not now that this was correct. Nonetheless, the play continues.

W: 6♦ K♦ A♦ 3♦
E: 4♦ 9♦ 7♦ J♦
N: 2♣ 5♣ Q♣ K♣
W: 2♦ 8♦ T♦ Q♦
S: A♣ 4♣ 4♥ J♣
S: 9♣ T♣ 2♠ 5♦

Scoring: MP

---

Now what?

[ArtK78]

I would switch to the ♠Q.

It appears that declarer has something like this:

xx
Qx
Qxx
AQJxxx

Besides, if declarer has the ♠K, he has 9 tricks anyway, unless it is singleton (a heart shift would allow the defense to take out dummy's side entry, and declarer would be stranded in one hand or the other). Partner appears to be guarding both majors, so he probably has something like Kxxx(x) and Jx(x) in the majors.

With a singleton spade K, declarer might have bid 3NT rather than 2NT. So I will play partner for the spade K.

It is quite possible that you can lock declarer in dummy and wind up scoring 2 clubs, a diamond and at least one trick in each major suit.

By the way, I would have led the ♦7. The defense might be easier if partner figures out to withhold the ♦A until the third round of the suit.

[MarkDean]

To me, partner throwing his diamond is a big clue. If he had king length of spades, why would he throw away a possible trick, when he has an entry? So I place opener with the king of spades. If he has another one, we are dead. So, I would play for opener to be 1336 with the stiff king of spades, and play a heart, to knock out the entry, and mess up his transportation.

[kfay]

MarkDean, on Mar 27 2009, 01:14 PM, said:

To me, partner throwing his diamond is a big clue.  If he had king length of spades, why would he throw away a possible trick, when he has an entry?  So I place opener with the king of spades.  If he has another one, we are dead.  So, I would play for opener to be 1336 with the stiff king of spades, and play a heart, to knock out the entry, and mess up his transportation.

Agree this means that partner doesn't have the ♠K. Disagree that it makes declarer 1336 because partner has an easy spade pitch if this is the case.

I'm just going to go passive and lead a black suit. Probably the spade Q to help partner out. This heart suit looks frozen and I'm not going to get a bottom by giving up 11 tricks.

[quiddity]

Was the 2C bid game forcing?

[vuroth]

quiddity, on Mar 27 2009, 01:34 PM, said:

Was the 2C bid game forcing?

I *think* not, but can't recall for sure.

[FrancesHinden]

Something strange is happening.
The only holding partner could not discard a spade from is 1098x, but then declarer has the rest and it's all irrelevant.


Partner threw his master diamond, thus clearly did not feel he could afford a major suit card. That means that he cannot have the king of spades, so declarer has the king of spades. We have already taken 3 tricks, thus declarer has the rest (in total, 4 clubs, 2 diamonds, 1 heart and 3 spades) because our queen of spades is dropping doubleton.

The only way this isn't happening is if declarer has singleton king of spades. Why partner didn't discard a spade from 109874 is still a mystery in that case, but less of a mystery. If declarer has KQ doubleton spade, and our clubs are rather better, then it makes sense for him to hand on to five spades. Partner doesn't know declarer has four club tricks.

If declarer started with 1336 with singleton spade king the only way we can stop 10 tricks is by playing a heart. Does it matter which heart?

If declarer has the queen of hearts we are stuck, because after king of hearts, ace, heart to hand partner's jack drops on the second round and he has 10 tricks anyway.

So we need partner to have Qx of hearts and switch to a low heart.

By the way, when declarer plays the king from KJ8 in dummy at trick 1, there are two possibilities: he is either wide open in another suit (very unlikely looking at dummy and the auction here) or he is solid in diamonds. That may be a hint for partner to duck at trick on with A10xx.