[FrancesHinden]

you are west
declarer is south

---

You lead the king of hearts, ace, 7, 4
Declarer rapidly plays the AK of spades from hand (you discard a heart), partner playing 2 then 3 of spades, then declarer stops to think.
He then plays a club to the 8 from partner and ace from hand.
Declarer plays a diamond,4, king, 2
Declarer plays the king of clubs (7 from partner, 9 from hand) and a third club, 10, ruff in hand

Declarer then plays a third trump.

What do you discard?

Partner plays the 7 of trumps.

Declarer now draws the last trump, partner plays the 10.

What do you discard?

Signals:
Partner will have given reverse attitude on holding the jack of hearts on the opening lead
Partner gives suit preference in trumps
Partner gives true standard count (if partner gives a signal at all) in the minor suits.

[gnasher]

I asked Frances to clarify a couple of things, and she asked me to post the following (she works in one of those corporate environments where important people aren't trusted to use their computers responsibly) :

The play began: ♥A, ♠AK, diamond to the king, club to the ace - sorry for mis-ordering the play.

It is an early board in a 32-board IMPs KO match. Declarer is good county standard but not Helgemo.

If the heart position is known, partner will give initial preference between the minors.
If the heart position is ambiguous, all 3 suits are in the game and partner give suit pref between them, and then will later give later more suit preference info if possible.

Your written agreement is that if partner follows 3 times in trumps with 3 suits in the game then:
Bottom-middle-up = lowest suit
Top-middle-bottom = highest suit
Middle-bottom-top = middle suit
Middle-top-bottom = neutral

On this hand partner is known to have 4 trumps (or the defence is uninteresting) but can only follow twice quickly. You must draw your own conclusions.

[rhm]

Trying to understand your clever signalling agreements is too bothersome for me and anyway the ♦2 seems to exist twice.

What seems to me fairly certain is that declarer has 9 certain tricks, 5 spades, 1 heart, 2 clubs and a diamond.
With trumps being gone, we should have 3 tricks by now, one club, one heart and one diamond.

It seems to me unlikely that a competent declarer would play that way with both QJ of diamonds.
He would probably try to establish a second diamond trick, before giving up trump control.
Also his urge to draw trumps seems to indicate that he is worried about heart ruffs, which makes sense if he has JT in hearts.
So I am inclined to play partner for a diamond honor.
Discard hearts and unblock the ♣Q on the third club to make room for an entry in partner's hand to push a diamond through.

Rainer Herrman

[gnasher]

Rainer, you don't have a club trick - declarer ruffed the third round.

[rhm]

gnasher, on 2012-February-28, 06:07, said:

Rainer, you don't have a club trick - declarer ruffed the third round.

Sorry I do not get it.

If I keep after trick 9 (having discarded hearts):

♥Q
♦AT
♣6

I have a fourth club and trumps are gone after trick 9, right?

Rainer Herrmann

[helene_t]

I am really struggling to get these counter-clockwise deals right.
This should be correct but now I have
you are north
declarer is west

---

[gszes]

the way it looks to me declarer started with one of six
hand types if they have any play for contract (with 1 more
heart and 1 less dia possible).

1. AKxx Jxx Qxxx Ax
2. AKxx Jxx QJxx Ax
3. AKxx Txx QJxx Ax
4. AKxx Txx Qxxx Ax
5. AKxx JTx Qxxx Ax
6. AKxx JTx QJxx Ax

we can ignore hand 2 and 6 since there is no way to set the hand

RHM has the position nailed perfectly and this defense handles
hands 1/4/5) IMO because P did not try to signal they had the
heart J by the way they played their trumps. With hand 3 declarer
was worried you might be 1543 and was afraid to try for a 2nd
dia trick for fear a third round would get ruffed. They then
ruffed out the club suit hoping it would eliminate clubs from
your hand and they could guess how to play by your discards
(knowing they were dead if you started with DIA A and KQJ hearts).

If p had played trumps 732 then we would have had to play declarer for hand 3 or 4 and hold
void Qx A Q
(this defense handles hands 3 and 4)
if declarer leads a heart P will win the J and we claim.
if declarer lead a dia we win lead small heart to p J and win club
return and claim.

Yet another triumph for suit preference when following to trumps (or the run of a
suit in nt <unless p needs to know count to know when to take their ace>) vs count.

[ArtK78]

rhm, on 2012-February-28, 06:04, said:

Trying to understand your clever signalling agreements is too bothersome for me and anyway the ♦2 seems to exist twice.

What seems to me fairly certain is that declarer has 9 certain tricks, 5 spades, 1 heart, 2 clubs and a diamond.
With trumps being gone, we should have 3 tricks by now, one club, one heart and one diamond.

It seems to me unlikely that a competent declarer would play that way with both QJ of diamonds.
He would probably try to establish a second diamond trick, before giving up trump control.
Also his urge to draw trumps seems to indicate that he is worried about heart ruffs, which makes sense if he has JT in hearts.
So I am inclined to play partner for a diamond honor.
Discard hearts and unblock the ♣Q on the third club to make room for an entry in partner's hand to push a diamond through.

Rainer Herrman

This is absolutely correct.

[mikeh]

My first two thoughts, on reading the OP, were: how did he end up in dummy after cashing the spade AK? and this is a trick question.

The trick question part arose because of the level of detail given on the play through to the 3rd round of clubs, when we weren't asked what we played to that trick.

There are lots of ways by which one can distinguish between players of different skill levels, but this is one of them: I think any good player would play the club Q on the 3rd round without even needing to think about it. Of course, if we did think about it, we'd do it anyway

[bluecalm]

Quote

I am really struggling to get these counter-clockwise deals right.

They are not counterclockwise. It's your imagination failing to adapt
In original hand you are on the left. Dummy is on the top. Play goes: bottom,left,top,right exactly in clockwise order
The problem is that sometimes bidding is on the table and sometimes it's besides the table. To discover which case we are dealing with we need to read those letters "WNES" and tell our imagination to adjust accordingly to them.


As to the play if we haven't unblocked Q♣ then there is not much we can do now I believe. Declarer is almost certainly 4-Jxx-4-2 and we need club communication.
If we failed to do so though I discard Q♣ and T♦ hoping declarer is 4-Jx-5-2 and partner missignaled diamond count.

[JLOGIC]

Cross to partner in clubs for a diamond through? FU partner if you have the HJ and you played low at every opportunity if I understand this correctly (all the low clubs after giving count, all the low trumps up the line). But yeah I doubt declarer has QJ of diamonds anyways lol.

[JLOGIC]

rhm, on 2012-February-28, 06:38, said:

Sorry I do not get it.

If I keep after trick 9 (having discarded hearts):

♥Q
♦AT
♣6

I have a fourth club and trumps are gone after trick 9, right?

Rainer Herrmann

yay matched the Rainer answer!

[xcurt]

JLOGIC, on 2012-February-29, 05:35, said:

Cross to partner in clubs for a diamond through? FU partner if you have the HJ and you played low at every opportunity if I understand this correctly (all the low clubs after giving count, all the low trumps up the line). But yeah I doubt declarer has QJ of diamonds anyways lol.

I think declarers line (and tempo) are consistent with planning to build a heart trick after drawing trumps... Oops. So I would play for our setting trick in diamonds, not hearts even without an inference from partners spot card plays.

[gszes]

I am concerned to see so many defenses based on whim
vs the beauty of the science presented by the defenders
signalling methods. In this case RHM has the clear cut
best position BECAUSE p failed to signal holding the
heart J by the order they played their spades. If p
had signalled the heart J we need to see it and defend
differently and NOT just guess:)))))))))))))))))))))))