[awm]

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You may not agree with the auction; in fact we were only in 5♦ at the table but 6♦ is the interesting play problem.

Opponents are not particularly strong (witness the 3♣...4♣ sequence).

The lead is the ♥7. East will duck if you call the ♥4, or otherwise cover dummy's card cheaply.

If you cash a top diamond, east will follow with the queen, west playing the three.

What is your plan to make 6♦?

[l milne]

Cool hand

[Hanoi5]

I'd take out the last trump and lead the ♠Q, what did LHO bid on? ♣KJT only? I also win if RHO returns a club instead of a spade.

[Phil]

I'll back the horse with the 2:5 odds.

[rduran1216]

Phil, on 2010-December-13, 23:11, said:

I'll back the horse with the 2:5 odds.

how can I fail. Q of spades after a trump wtp?

[psyck]

If LHO has been bidding on just the !c suit with a 1228 kind of hand, you would have to strip the other suits & throw him in with the !c, pitching !s from hand...but highly unlikely that he lead a doubleton !h instead of singleton !s...

[jukmoi]

I would have tried entering dummy with a trump and low spade from there.

[Fluffy]

Running diamonds gives you some extra chances of RHO missdefending than a spade from dummy. Ruff a club in the proccess for more accuracy

[awm]

Hanoi5, on 2010-December-13, 22:11, said:

I'd take out the last trump and lead the ♠Q, what did LHO bid on? ♣KJT only? I also win if RHO returns a club instead of a spade.

This was the line I took at the table. The ♠K was with East, but he wasn't up to returning a spade (no big surprise there) and thus was squeezed in the majors. West had 2128 distribution.

jukmoi, on 2010-December-14, 02:27, said:

I would have tried entering dummy with a trump and low spade from there.

I believe this is a better line. East has more spades than west. On the actual lie of the cards east has no effective defense.

[nige1]

awm, on 2010-December-13, 20:07, said:

You may not agree with the auction; in fact we were only in 5♦ at the table but 6♦ is the interesting play problem.
Opponents are not particularly strong (witness the 3♣...4♣ sequence).
The lead is the ♥7. East will duck if you call the ♥4, or otherwise cover dummy's card cheaply.
If you cash a top diamond, east will follow with the queen, west playing the three.
What is your plan to make 6♦?

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jukmoi, on 2010-December-14, 02:27, said:

I would have tried entering dummy with a trump and low spade from there.

Agree with jukmoi.

• If East has ♠K, you are home.
• If West has ♠K but fails to return a ♠, then you can try a double squeeze.

[rhm]

From the bidding and early play it is clear that East is at least 4-4 in the majors, since West has at least 9 cards in the minors and does hold one or two ♥ at most. If this is true the hand can be made against any layout and any defense.
The idea must be to squeeze East in the majors without rectifying the count early. If you play a ♠ early, a ♠ back would severe communication with dummy. Not so easy! On the first trick play a low ♥ from dummy. Cash all ♦ but one and the ♣ace and come down to the following six card ending, of which you need 5 tricks:

Dummy:

♠AJ42 ♥J8

declarer:

♠Q7 ♥A32 ♦4

East probably will have come down to only majors, but it does not really matter.

If East is down to 4♠-2♥:

Play ♥A, ♥ and East will have to return a ♠. Your hand is high

If East has at most 3 cards left in ♠:

Play the ♠Q. If East wins or the queen gets covered, duck. You have 3♠ tricks and the remainder of the tricks.

If the ♠queen holds and East has at most two ♥ left, play ♥A, heart and your hand is high.
If the ♠queen holds and East has 3 cards left in ♥, play your last ♦ and discard a low ♠ from dummy.
If East discards a spade or has at most one ♠ left, finesse the ♠J and either the finesse wins (13 tricks) or East is end-played in ♥, if he has the ♠king. (That is why you should not play the ♥J at trick one)
If East has two cards left in ♠ and discards a ♥ from 3 cards, throw him in by playing ♥ace, ♥. You get two further ♠ tricks.

Rainer Herrmann

[Flameous]

Nicely done, I doubt that is what awm thought as a solution cause it's far from easy

[Phil]

rduran1216, on 2010-December-14, 00:04, said:

how can I fail. Q of spades after a trump wtp?

AWM is a much smarter player than to post a hand that simply requires a finesse, so I suggest you look deeper into the position. I also suggest you go to the bother of counting your tricks.

[rduran1216]

Phil, on 2010-December-14, 10:31, said:

AWM is a much smarter player than to post a hand that simply requires a finesse, so I suggest you look deeper into the position. I also suggest you go to the bother of counting your tricks.

upon further review, absent the cognac my blood possessed merely hours ago, I think LHO has a 2128 hand, its still kinda tough who has K of spades, I suppose I'll cash the A of clubs diamond to the 9 ruff a club, diamond to the 8 and a spade towards the Q.


Just Saw AWM's post, haha.

[dellache]

I appreciate Rainer's line, but against weak oppos, I would play (quick) like this : cash the ♣Ace, cash the ♦Ace, ♦ to dummy, ♠ to queen. Now if West scores the ♠K I guess that West will play the easy ♣K. GAME OVER.

[jukmoi]

Does not rhm`s line require guessing EW distribution correctly in the ending?

[rhm]

jukmoi, on 2010-December-15, 06:58, said:

Does not rhm`s line require guessing EW distribution correctly in the ending?

The defense has a (theoretical) chance if East has exactly 4 cards in ♠.
This probably means that West would have to be 3♠=1♥=2♦=7♣ and East 4♠=5♥=1♦=3♣

In the six card ending after 1 ♥ and 5 ♦s and the ♣A play, West must keep all his ♠ and come down to 3 cards in both black suits. If West discards any ♠, the defense is dead. East must come down to 2 cards in ♠, ♥QTx, ♣x

Declarer now plays the ♠Q and either West must not cover or East must duck from ♠Kx!
Declarer now plays his last ♦, West must again discard a ♣ and East can now release a ♥!
Unless declarer smells a rat, he will now either repeat the ♠ finesse or try to end-play East by playing ♥A, ♥.
If East comes in, he can play an unexpected carefully preserved ♣. Down two.

However, this requires a far more difficult defense than returning a ♠, if you mis-guess the ♠K early in the play. If ♠ are 3-4 your chances of guessing the ♠K are not much better than 50%
In my view even a world class pair is unlikely to find this defense at the table, but would certainly return a ♠.
Since my line of play can not keep the ♣ queen as a threat against West, it is also slightly better on my line of play to cash the ♣A early and go dummy to ruff the ♣Q, in case East has only 2 cards in ♣.

Rainer Herrmann

[gnasher]

jukmoi, on 2010-December-15, 06:58, said:

Does not rhm`s line require guessing EW distribution correctly in the ending?

Yes, but we have a pretty good idea already - I would bet quite a lot that hearts are 1=5.

[Flameous]

Yeah, it does. I think it's quite easy in most cases cause the lead was likely a singleton.
However if LHO started with K xx xx KJ 8th, we likely have trouble guessing the right distribution.

Have to admit that as much as I like rhm's line of play, it might be a bit unpractical, since you are almost always winning by playing a spade towards queen and especially it wins when the squeeze line might fail. Considering the bidding, I'd assume LHO isn't too good player so I wouldn't assume he'd fire back the spade if happened to hold the king. Especially after taking the club ace to give him a "safe" exit.

[mfa1010]

Rhm's line of running trumps is of course the right one. But against these opponents I think we are approx. 99% if we just run the ♠Q. There is no way east is going to return a spade if he is a weak player -only if by accident (hence the 1%).