[Phil]

Had a bout with insomnia last night. This was a deal I played on Jack:

---

The opening lead is the ♠K.

A continuation if you like:

Spoiler

Assuming you win the ♠A, you play a club and it continues 9, Q, K. The ♠J is returned.

[whereagles]

hmmm.. I don't see it. Ducking the spade K and playing for ♥KT/QT on opener requires RHO to have 4 diamonds and a misdefense. So I guess I'll take the spade ace and lead a club up.

[Phil]

OK you lead a club up and RHO wins the K and plays the ♠ J. Now what?

[gnasher]

It's a bit better once RHO plays ♠J back. I ruff in dummy, ruff a club, and play a heart, hoping that the hearts are KQx-10x or H10-Hxx.

[rhm]

It seems to me that you can always make the contract provided trumps break and you loose only 2 trump tricks.
But since you can not draw trumps this will require that West holds either both trump honors, which is not unlikely given the bidding, or if West has specifically ♥KT or ♥QT
The play is tricky if East holds only a doubleton in ♦.

If West holds: ♠KQ8xx,♥KQ,♦xxx,♣Axx you must avoid that East gets a ♦ ruff with a low trump.

T1:♠ace
T2:♣ to the king
T3:♠jack ruffed
T4:♣ ruff
T5:♦ to dummy
T6:♣ ruff. If the ♣ace drops:
T7:♦ to dummy
T8:♣queen, discarding the ♦ace.

continue ♦ if West does not ruff. If East ruffs low, over-ruff.

If the ♣ace does not drop, continue ♦.

Rainer Herrmann

[gnasher]

Rainer, you seem to be going down when West has KQxxxx KQx x Axx, when you could have made by leading trumps at trick three. I think a 6-2 spade break is quite likely when East returns ♠J.

[rhm]

gnasher, on 2011-March-01, 17:58, said:

Rainer, you seem to be going down when West has KQxxxx KQx x Axx, when you could have made by leading trumps at trick three. I think a 6-2 spade break is quite likely when East returns ♠J.

You are right. On a probability basis it is better to play West for KQx and the plays are not compatible.
I just mentioned the play because it is artistic.

Rainer Herrmann

[whereagles]

Phil, on 2011-February-28, 10:57, said:

OK you lead a club up and RHO wins the K and plays the ♠ J. Now what?

Duck spade, ruff next spade, ruff club, play trumps for 1 loser (KT/QT with LHO). It's necessary to duck a spade before ruffing, otherwise RHO forces dummy with a 3rd spade when in with his first heart.

I thought of this for like 15 secs. How bad did I do?

[dellache]

Actually I think there's no need to hope that West has got H10 or KQ(x) in Hearts, in case spades are 6-2.
As an example, let's suppose West has : KQxxxx Kx xx Axx to East : Jx QTx xxx KTxxx which looks compatible with the bidding/play.
If we play [1]♠Ace, [2]♣ to J/King, [3]Ruff the J♠, [4]Ruff club, [5]♥ to Jack and Queen, what can East do ?
Nothing.
We just loose 1♣ and 2♥.
Still I'm still not sure how to play this throughout.
I'll try to finish my own analysis and post something later if I find it interesting.

[dellache]

Here's my analysis.
1. We suppose that East doesn't have 7+ HCP or 6HCP+spade-fit (pass over DBL). Hence combinations like ♥Qx by West become unlikely. Anyway this has a small impact.

2. The EW combinations that remain where we may succeed seem to consist of :
KQxxx(x) KQ x(x+) A(x+)
KQxxx(x) KQx x(x+) A(x+)
KQxxxx Kx xx Axx
KQxxxx KT x Axxx (unlikely).

3. If we start with [1]♠Ace, [2]♣ to King, [3]♠J ruffed, [4]♣ruffed, [5]♥ up, it seems that we preserve our chances in almost all cases (Rainer's cute case where West has KQxxx KQ xxx Axx is one of the exceptions !)

4. At this stage, defense comes into play : if West plays a small ♥, we must play the ♥J. If East takes that, we have to hope West was 6223. If the Jack scores, the rest should be fairly easy. The problem is when West plays an honor (we take the Ace). After this...

5. We have a true problem : we can always proceed with [6] ♣ruff, and we suppose the Ace falls (there are variants if it doesn't fall, and we can still make -- can't we ? Yes). NOW this is decision time :
- if West had KQxxxx KQ xx Axx, we just have to play on Diamonds and abandon trumps ;
- if West had KQxxx KQx xx Axx, we must play trumps before diamonds (♠9 is a nice card).
Now I don't really see how to decide (frequencies favor the latter, play of the ♠J favor the former ?). The same kind of guess may arise in less likely distributions of the minor (variants).

Difficult to conclude.

[Phil]

Dellache, I enjoy reading your posts and I think you analyzed this nicely.

If anyone wants to check out the actual hand and try it, its in Session 4 of the Cap Gemini pairs on Jack. As a matter of fact, I'm mildly surprised that because this hand was played at such a high profile tournament, that it wasn't written up. Or maybe it was.

[gnasher]

dellache, on 2011-March-02, 15:57, said:

- if West had KQxxx KQx xx Axx, we must play trumps before diamonds (♠9 is a nice card).

I don't think this hand is at all likely - Jxx 10x xxx Kxxxx is a routine raise after 1♠ (dbl). Hence I think you should play for spades 6-2.

[gnasher]

However, that still doesn't tell us what to do after West plays a heart honour - he could have either KQxxxx KQ xx Axx or KQxxxx KQx x Axx.