[pclayton]

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No one vul and you play in 6♥ at MPs.

Auction: 1♥ by you, 3♠ on left, 4N (!) by pard, 5♠ on right....you settle in 6♥. Opening lead: ♦Q.

Plan the play.

[inquiry]

You are lucky to have avoided the spade lead I guess. The diamond queen seems surely a singleton on this auction, since I am looking at T987 of diamonds between my hands. Of course, i it would pay to know the players.

I guess West is long in hearts and EAST is short in hearts (or hearts are 2-2). One plan might be to play heart to my hand, heart the dummy, and then run the diamond ten, then use the club ruff to throw away a spade on the diamond ACE. But if WEST has one diamond, this gives you only 3D, 2D ruff (or 1S, 1D, or 2S), plus the club ACE, and at most five hearts in you hand EVEN IF HEARTS are 2-2. That is only 11 tricks. So back to the drawing board.

Clubs seem the next best source of extra tricks. If EAST has 4 spades and five diamonds as you now assume. He is likely short in hearts, maybe teh stiff queen. But what you need here is sufficient entries to pull trumps and establish clubs. Diamond king is an entry, and while you can ruff something to dummy, if you have a trump loser, that will not be good enough, as you will not have time to throw away both clubs in your hand. So you have to play for Hearts 2-2, or you can pick up WEST's three hearts. So you play WEST to hold a distibution like 6-3-1-3, 7-3-1-2, or 7-3-1-2, or 6-2-1-4 (with three without the queen)

So, give up on delayed diamond hook, win diamond ace in hand. Cash heart ACE. Did east play the ten? Did EAST play the Queen? Now, club to ace, club ruff, heart to king (picking up suit hopefully - cash jack earlier if queen falls at trick one), ruff a club, diamond to king, ruff club (if necessary). Ruff diamond, take two pitches on clubs.

Ben

S-xxxxxx H-xx d

[inquiry]

Jlall, on Apr 7 2005, 02:18 PM, said:

Ben in your line even if the ten drops on your right lho has Q9 left. If he has Q9x of hearts to begin with you wont make because when you pitch a spade on the club he will ruff in and cash his spade. So you need stiff Q or 2-2 to make plus something good in clubs.

I would just take the moron line and play for 2-2 hearts in which case im cold. (2 rounds of trumps and then diamonds pitching a spade from dummy). if RHO has 3 hearts to the queen i can fall back on QJ tight of diamonds.

Well, I never hooked a heart justin, I asked if the Ten or Queen fell. If queen fell (I was cashing the heart JACK). I know the heart 9 is out. Your line fails agaisnt the likely 5-1 diamond split, even with 2-2 hearts. East wins the diamond Jack, and you ruff a spade. You still have a losing diamond and spade in your hand and only one trump left in dummy. Now if you ahd the SEVEN of diamonds too....

Your line requires 2-2 hearts and 4-2 diamonds. The line I suggest works against 3-1 hearts if the queen falls, and 2-2 hearts if clubs are behaving. I have to admit givien the 5S bid by RHO opoenent and the diamond queen lead, I am much more ready to believe this is a signleton than it looks like you are.

Ben

[flytoox]

Dummy is lack of entry to establish club and get time to discard spade, so I will play my hand. Is opening leader leading singleton DQ? If that is the case then he rates to have long (relatively) heart, in that case I dont think I can make it. So I will play the simple game, cashing two rounds DAK, then D8, discard s from dummy whatever LHO plays on it.

[Fluffy]

if ♥2-2 is a must ruffing 3♣ in hand will make when ♦ are 5-1, but there is no clue that ♦ are worse divided than ♣, I believe the ♦Q lead was from QJ rather than singleton, so I'll try 2♥ rounds + ♦A +♦9 run.

[pclayton]

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This is the full hand, and I think its a bear. At the table I played (too quickly):

1. K♦
2. ♥ to J
3. ♥ to K
4. A♦
5. 8♦, pitching a spade, East winning. East plays an easy heart back to me and I'm -1

I like the ♥ hook at T2, but then I think its right to play A♦, 8♦ pitching a spade, before you release the ♥K. The rest is easy.

Even if LHO has the presumed diamond length (well, thats why I hooked the ♥J), you can ruff the diamond (assuming its covered) with the KING, A♣, ruff club and play the good diamond pitching the spade.

Note if trumps are 3-1, things may get tricky if you don't draw one round of trump. West can uppercut dummy on the 3rd lead. You still might get home if you pitch the spade, but you are relying on a trump coup in the endgame I think, since you need all of dummy's little trump to ruff the last ♦ and 2 spades.

If diamonds are 5-1, I think you are toast, unless you play clubs to be 3-3 and trumps to be 2-2, but thats real unlikely with all this bidding.