[neilkaz]

I had this hand a few months ago in a typical adv/exp BBO IMP game. I'm South and declaring 4♥ after PD's unfortunate choice of Stayman in this uncontested 1NT auction. N/B players..what's the best way to play this after a low ♣ lead?

Adv and above please wait a day or two before responding or hide answers.

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[kuhchung]

I am not advanced, but I will hide my answer anyway.

Spoiler

Cash the HA and HK. If the Q doesn't fall and hearts are 3-2, strip and black suits and exit a heart. I considered leading the HJ to induce a cover from Qxx, but...

If hearts are 4-1, I think we have to find the DT without relinquishing control of the black suits. And it would have been silly to waste the HJ now.

[neilkaz]

kuhchung quickly got this "textbook" hand correct and the many available finesse options didn't fool him. When I played this hand on BBO, my "expert" partner call me a moron and left when I didn't finesse in trumps but when they split 3-2 I had no issues as long as the player with the queen couldn't ruff in and exit in the other black suit.

This type of endplay, while more likely an intermediate concept, occurs quite often when there's a trump honor missing and you can't drop it. The idea is to force the opps to lead the suit you don't want to break, either so you avoid a guess or so they must give you a ruff and a sluff, whereby you gain an extra trump trick and dispose of a loser.

Often you have to ruff in one hand to strip a suit from both hands or through a loser on a winner, or even a loser on a loser.

Lets say that the combined hands were changed to remove all finessing options in both red suits. Then the hand should be played the same way and if trumps split 3-2 you still make due to the end play once the black suits are stripped assuming the Q can't ruff in time with an exit card.