[ArtK78]

IMP pairs (ACBL game on BBO).

You pick up:

---

Note: The opening bid by East may be made on as few as 10HCP at this vulnerability.

(1) Do you agree with the negative double over 1♥?
(2) Do you agree with the penalty double of 2♥?
(3) What is your lead?

[daveharty]

1. yes
2. yes
3. club

[gnasher]

(1) Yes.
(2) I don't agree that double should be penalties, but if we play it as that I'm delighted to be able to make one.
(3) ♣8.

[S2000magic]

1. No. (It would be helpful to know partner's proclivities in reopening, but this still looks like a massive misfit; I prefer to let the opponents play massive misfits.)
2. Yes, if it's played for penalties. As the original negative double should show short hearts, this double would also show short hearts, so the penalty interpretation is, at best, tenuous.
3. ♣8

By the way, against a competent declarer, prepare to be endplayed in trumps at least once. Unfortunately, partner's likely void, so he won't be able to lead trumps through declarer.

[Phil]

1) Easy yes. I don't want to defend at the one level with this.

2) Yes. I'm not 100% sure if double is penalty, but I think it should be. I'm over the bidder and we have not found a fit. This looks a parallel to:

1♦ - pass - pass - 1♥
2♦ - Dbl

Which I play as penalties, although most seem to play it as responsive.

By the way, it seems partner might be pulling this from the sound of the auction?

3) Club 8. Looks like a logical place to establish tricks, although I do not love it. I'll let the genii lead the ♣T and explain how they are catering to AJx in dummy and 9x in declarer's hand.

[MrAce]

1- yes

2-yes

3-♣

Of course looking at the title of topic and where it is posted and the questions u asked, since everything we did so far seems reasonable, i expect them to make this 2♥

[whereagles]

yuck.. I suppose I'd reproduce this auction. Now ♠K.

[mikeh]

Yes, yes and the club 8, as with most here.

If I had to make another lead, it would be the club K, but that is too prone to mishap, not to mention declarer with Qxx and partner with AJxx

The spade K seems very wrong to me.....we probably don't need to play spades now, even when we hold one or both of the A and J, and if we are off both cards, we will regret the K lead. Since partner has announced minors, the odds just seem better that he has cards where the club lead works than where it doesn't and a spade would have.

[JLOGIC]

Very surprised by the answers to 1, especially "I don't want to defend at the one level with this." We are white/red, we have a void in partners suit, 6 trumps, and good defense, and not even enough where we are sure for game. If we got to defend 1H X I would be extremely happy. If the reason for doubling is that it might hurt our later auction too much assuming we don't get to defend 1H X, then I could see that, but not wanting to defend 1H X seems really weird. I think the possibility of it happening is too high (since our void is in partners suit, they could easily have no effective place to run, or if they do it could be diamonds and they might have trouble figuring that out) to give up on it at this vul.

[ArtK78]

Here is the whole hand:

http://tinyurl.com/7tm29cj

The auction went as advertised, and I made the mistake of leading a top spade, handing declarer his 8th trick.

I have not bothered to expend the energy needed to determine if declarer could make 8 tricks on a low club lead.

[MrAce]

ArtK78, on 2012-January-12, 14:05, said:

Here is the whole hand:

http://tinyurl.com/7tm29cj

The auction went as advertised, and I made the mistake of leading a top spade, handing declarer his 8th trick.

I have not bothered to expend the energy needed to determine if declarer could make 8 tricks on a low club lead.

Double Dummy analysis upto GIB

lead of ♠K= 9 tricks for declarer

lead of small ♣ = 8 tricks for declarer

[rduran1216]

MrAce, on 2012-January-12, 14:18, said:

Double Dummy analysis upto GIB

lead of ♠K= 9 tricks for declarer

lead of small ♣ = 8 tricks for declarer

repeated endplays are fun.

[gnasher]

So Justin did well, conceding only 360 when the rest of us lost 670.

[MrAce]

gnasher, on 2012-January-12, 15:33, said:

So Justin did well, conceding only 360 when the rest of us lost 670.

I doubt it

South will bid 2♥ over DBL (at least i would) and if did not, there is a chance North can be creative and come up with a S.o.S rdbl

Now that i see all hands, i lead small spade

[mikeh]

gnasher, on 2012-January-12, 15:33, said:

So Justin did well, conceding only 360 when the rest of us lost 670.

Many of us would do even better....we'd play a style in which an opening bid showed an opening bid. Had East held one, our chances would have been somewhat better.

[ArtK78]

mikeh, on 2012-January-12, 15:59, said:

Many of us would do even better....we'd play a style in which an opening bid showed an opening bid. Had East held one, our chances would have been somewhat better.

From OP:

Note: The opening bid by East may be made on as few as 10HCP at this vulnerability.

So this should not be a surprise.

[Statto]

MrAce, on 2012-January-12, 14:18, said:

lead of small ♣ = 8 tricks for declarer

The declarer play to make 8 tricks seems inspired. I doubt many would find it at the table...

[gnasher]

Statto, on 2012-January-12, 17:00, said:

The declarer play to make 8 tricks seems inspired. I doubt many would find it at the table...

I don't think it's that that hard to find. The bidding and lead make it obvious that LHO is 4603 or conceivably 4702. It's also obvious that the right line is to score as many trumps as we can, so a club ruff at trick two is clear. Having done that, what can you possibly do except lead a low spade, perhaps after cashing a top trump?

[MrAce]

Statto, on 2012-January-12, 17:00, said:

The declarer play to make 8 tricks seems inspired. I doubt many would find it at the table...

I agree, not many would.

But a good declarer can solve or come very close to explore the EW shape by just listening to bidding imo.

DBL of 1♥ (assuming was std and showed exactly 4♠)

1♦ and then 2♣, i think this is 5-4 due to lack of ♦ lead. This makes East 3154 and west 4603. It will come down to which card to play from dummy when/if west plays a small ♠. Seems very tuff to get it right but i think east may help declarer with his discard on 2nd ♥. Actually if spade honors are split, defense could defeat him i guess so maybe he will have to play west for KQ spades.

I admit i maybe influenced by knowing 4 hands but a focused declarer wld get it right imo

[mikeh]

ArtK78, on 2012-January-12, 16:58, said:

From OP:

Note: The opening bid by East may be made on as few as 10HCP at this vulnerability.

So this should not be a surprise.

I didn't say it was a surprise...I only implied that many of us would not find ourselves in this position.....those who open light rarely recognize the problems they generate...altho, admittedly, the same can be said for those who open conservatively. I don't go -360 or worse on this hand....but I will get poor scores on some other hands by being conservative.