[Echognome]

Scoring: MP

P - 1♥
2♣* - 2NT
3NT - All Pass
*Drury

---

This was my favorite hand of yesterday. West leads the ♣5 which goes to the 6 in dummy and East's A while you play the 3. East returns the ♣2 with your K winning. You play a heart to the K and Q and on the second heart, West discards the ♠2.

Plan the play from here.

[mikeh]

West appears to be 4=1=4=4, and chose an unattractive choice for lead: J9xx.

I lead the heart 10. Rho ducks, let's say..altho it makes no difference. I cross in clubs and run the hearts.

LHO has to keep the club J and we will have played 3 clubs and 5 hearts, to reduce to a 5 card endgame.

A lot depends on how lho discards, and that in turn is constrained by his holdings.

If he has, for example, HHxx x KJxx J9xx, he is in major league pain. He has to keep the club J, and the Kx of diamonds (assuming we will read the position) and he has to keep HH in spades.. if he reduces to a stiff spade, we play spade to the A and low back to the 10.

So if LHO reduces to 2=0=2=1, for whatever reason, we pitch the club 10 from dummy, reducing to Ax void xxx void and rho has to keep 3 spades so reduces to 2 diamonds, so now we know that each has 2 diamonds and we play A and Q of the suit... lho can win and cash his good club, but then has to lead a spade to dummy which has the good A and a good diamond.

All that is missing is to make dummy's last diamond the 7.

If LHO held Hxxx or xxxx in spades and can thus 'afford' to pitch 3 of them, we keep the club 10 in dummy, cash the spade ace, as a dentist's coup, and then exit the club to LHO, who is reduced to 3 diamonds and must lead into the AQ.

3N making 4 will be a good result.

[mikeh]

I know nobody else answered, but I would like to know how the hand actually was

[gnasher]

mikeh, on Jul 21 2008, 12:58 AM, said:

I know nobody else answered

If you wanted more discussion, you should have started by posting a wrong or incomplete analysis.

[Echognome]

mikeh, on Jul 20 2008, 03:58 PM, said:

I know nobody else answered, but I would like to know how the hand actually was

Mike - You nailed it.

http://www.acbl.org/....php?bulletin=3
(page 4)

[Edmunte1]

Nice 3 suit strip squeeze

[ashdown4]

On a different opening lead the hand becomes an interesting carding problem. After the same auction I won SQ at trick 1 as a third hand and shifted to a diamomd from 9876.

Which spot should I return to get partner to continue suit despite that scary DT? At the table D6 intended to trick partner into thinking I have Axx(x) of spades did not work.

[jkdood]

IF I elect to play a diamond, I must consider South might have AJx, and can't afford for pard to win and play it back. So 2nd high from a worthless holding, or the 9, both work for me. Low to show strong-interest-in-continuing scares me.

Pard might anyway infer my length from South's play and his own holding, and play it back if/when right.

[ashdown4]

Hmm, this carding problem needs more context. Third hand holds 4 hearts marking partner with a singleton. The opening lead is specifically S2. Having led from a 4 card suit, opening leader is a big favorite to hold 4=1=4=4.

The third hand is trying to get partner to continue diamonds from any 4 card holding including KJxx.

[awm]

I had a much more difficult problem on this same hand. At my table, the lead was a spade. I held up two rounds and won the third in dummy. Then I played a club to the king (holding). I returned to dummy with a heart (both following) and played another club to RHO's ace. He returned a diamond and I hopped ace (if the queen loses, I am down). Now I had the following end position:

Scoring: MP

---

Note that I know much less about the distribution on this hand. Everyone has followed to everything, and all I really know is that LHO lead from a four card spade suit. At this point I have two reasonable options:

(1) Play a heart to the queen, making nine tricks if hearts are not 4-1 on my left.

(2) Play the club queen, making ten tricks if hearts are 3-2 and clubs are 3-3, or nine tricks if hearts are 3-2 and clubs are 4-2, but going down if hearts are 4-1.

So the question is, which is the better play? There are a few interesting points, including that some people may be in hearts, that some people may receive a more favorable lead (especially if LHO is in fact 4144), and of course that it is MP scoring.

Needless to say I took the wrong option at the table.

[jkdood]

I wouldn't rule out KJxx x KQx Jxxxx or such for pard, but if declarer only has 2 diamonds he will play an honor not low (as from Ajx) so yeah, how does pard with the K of d know if declarer has AQx or AQ if the Q is played on your lead at T2?

The 6 works there for sure.

But if pard has Kxxx x KQx Jxxxx and chose a reasonable spade, a diamond back isn't so great.

Wow, good question!! Not sure there's an answer other than an 8 or 9 and let pard work out the guess (of what to return) from declarer's tempo and other inferences maybe ? After all, the 8 or 9 does not PRECLUDE 98xx or such. Does it?

[sathyab]

awm, on Jul 28 2008, 11:21 PM, said:

I had a much more difficult problem on this same hand. At my table, the lead was a spade. I held up two rounds and won the third in dummy. Then I played a club to the king (holding). I returned to dummy with a heart (both following) and played another club to RHO's ace. He returned a diamond and I hopped ace (if the queen loses, I am down). Now I had the following end position:

Dealer: North Vul: N/S Scoring: MP

♠   ♥ QT ♦ T4 ♣ T7 ♠   ♥ A954 ♦ Q ♣ Q

Note that I know much less about the distribution on this hand. Everyone has followed to everything, and all I really know is that LHO lead from a four card spade suit. At this point I have two reasonable options:

(1) Play a heart to the queen, making nine tricks if hearts are not 4-1 on my left.

(2) Play the club queen, making ten tricks if hearts are 3-2 and clubs are 3-3, or nine tricks if hearts are 3-2 and clubs are 4-2, but going down if hearts are 4-1.

So the question is, which is the better play? There are a few interesting points, including that some people may be in hearts, that some people may receive a more favorable lead (especially if LHO is in fact 4144), and of course that it is MP scoring.

Needless to say I took the wrong option at the table.

When you played a club to the King which held, LHO would most likely have given honest count. After RHO wins the club Ace it should probably confirm your suspicion that clubs were not going to break 3-3 and settled for nine tricks instead perhaps ? Also when you traveled to dummy in hearts RHO might have given honest count as well?

This brings about an interesting point about opening leads on such hands at MP. Given the 1h-2c-2nt-3nt auction it looks as though the declaring side is well prepared for the other major. I'd be more nervous about blowing a trick by leading a spade rather than a minor. Are there any arguments in favor of leading one suit versus another ?

[awm]

I suspect it is unlikely that a good LHO will give true count in clubs on this deal. In fact he signaled for an odd number of clubs when holding four. It is perhaps slightly more likely that I will get a true count signal in hearts (my recollection is that RHO did in fact give true count).

Our auction was 1NT-P-3NT-All Pass, which I suspect will be common at many tables (perhaps more common than Echognome's auction starting with 1♥).

My view at the table was that if we assume LHO doesn't have four hearts (since I'm always down in that case) and doesn't have a five-card minor (likely to lead that instead of spades) then he can have any of 4333, 4243, 4234, or 4144. These are probably fairly close to equally likely, except that holding two or three four-card suits he might've selected a different lead (which makes these holdings less likely, and also means that in those cases some people are probably having an easier time of their declarer play than I am). Playing the club king gains on the first two positions and breaks even on the third, losing only on the fourth.

[Bbradley62]

never mind

[Free]

(Can't access the full hand from here)

I think I'm missing something about Mike's line: if you play ♥T and RHO doesn't cover, you go to your hand with ♣ while RHO is out of ♣ right? So if he ruffs he can continue ♠ and easily defeat the contract.

[Phil]

Free, on Jun 2 2010, 08:34 AM, said:

(Can't access the full hand from here)

I think I'm missing something about Mike's line: if you play ♥T and RHO doesn't cover, you go to your hand with ♣ while RHO is out of ♣ right? So if he ruffs he can continue ♠ and easily defeat the contract.

Even after two years its still difficult to ruff a trick defending 3N.

But hey, if a sominex coup won't work after this amount of time, it won't ever work.

[Free]

Phil, on Jun 2 2010, 03:46 PM, said:

Free, on Jun 2 2010, 08:34 AM, said:

(Can't access the full hand from here)

I think I'm missing something about Mike's line: if you play ♥T and RHO doesn't cover, you go to your hand with ♣ while RHO is out of ♣ right?  So if he ruffs he can continue ♠ and easily defeat the contract. 

Even after two years its still difficult to ruff a trick defending 3N.

But hey, if a sominex coup won't work after this amount of time, it won't ever work.

I knew I missed something!