Undiscussed bids in the slam zone

Playing with an occasional partner in a strong club game, we have already had a couple of misunderstandings. In spite of that, we are doing well (we'd finish with 54%).

As East, I picked up:

E

North

♠

A

♥

AQJ63

♦

953

♣

QJ103

South dealt and passed and the bidding goes:

West

East

2NT¹

3♦²

3♥

?

(1) 20-21

(2) transfer to hearts

What's your rebid holding my cards?

I decided to pattern out, and bid 4C.  Partner, unsure what this was (cue-bid self-agreeing hearts?) kept the bidding open with 4H and that's how we ended up in 6H for this result:

I should have kept it simple.  Knowing that we were going to slam anyway, I should have simply bid 5NT over 3H.  Partner could bid 6H with 3 of them, bid 6NT with his actual holding.  If partner decides to scramble to 6C or 6D, I can pass 6C or correct 6D to 6NT.

4C, undiscussed, was simply too risky.


p.s. Thanks to John Goold for putting his Bridge Blogging Tools on the cloud. The hand diagrams in this post were formatted using his tools.

Sticking to a plan

Playing matchpoints, West has opened 1S over which partner (North) overcalled 2D.  They land up in 4S and partner leads the Ace of diamonds and I see:

Dealer: W Vul: None	North ♠ ♥ ♦ ♣
West ♠ ♥ ♦ ♣		East ♠ AKxx ♥ xxxx ♦ x ♣ xxxx
	South ♠ x ♥ Axxxx ♦ Jxxxx ♣ xx
Bidding:	1S - 2D - 4S	HTML Bridge Hand Layout Creator

With a singleton on the board and declarer having a singleton, I pretty much have to show suit preference.  So I played the Jack of diamonds to tell partner about my heart honor.

Partner duly switched to the ten of hearts and I won with the Ace.  Now what?

Partner needs a club through, I thought, and led a club.  This was horribly wrong.  Can you see why?

The answer is in the card that partner led -- he led the 10 of hearts.  That denies KQJ of hearts.  Declarer must have those 3 hearts.  So, the ten must be a singleton!  I needed to give partner a ruff.

Rectifying the count

At matchpoints in a strong club game, I was West and playing in 3NT after an auction that went 1NT-3NT.  North led the 3 of spades (3rd and 5th leads at NT):

Questions (at the table, I got this wrong):

1. Do you go up with Jack of spades, or duck?
2. What's your line?

Who has the 5-card spade suit? Assuming that North had a choice of major leads if he had 3 cards in each, it is more likely that he has the 5-card suit, and that the 3 is his 5th highest card.

Given that North has the 5-card suit, he would have led the King from KQ10 (internal sequence). So, South has one of these three honors.

Who has the 10? The odds are 4-2 that North has any specific card. So, let's put the 10 of spades with North.  Now, do you go up with Jack of spades?

Interestingly, it doesn't matter because you are going to duck this trick and win the spade continuation. Otherwise, you have no safe way of rectifying the count.

Having thus rectified the count, can you win all the remaining tricks on a squeeze? I'll leave it as a puzzle for you -- you can try to play out the hand on BBO.  Post your answer as a comment.

Sloppiness at IMPs

One of the nicest events in the Seattle bridge scene is the Yarington Round Robin.  It takes place over several months at peoples' houses.  Essentially, eight people get together in someone's home, and play 28 boards of bridge.  This year, there are 7 teams, so six matches to be played over six months.

It's heaps of fun, because we are essentially hanging out, eating dinner, drinking wine, and playing cards.  There are no masterpoints at stake, and winning any of the matches is unlikely -- we are the weakest team in the A-bracket, a bracket where a couple of teams have made it deep into the Reisinger and other national events.

Yesterday was my team's first match, and we lost 30 imps due to sloppiness on my part.

On this hand, South opened 1H, North bid 1S and partner (East) bid 2D.  N-S ended up in 3NT and I was on lead:

I lead the 4 of diamonds, of course.  Declarer inserted the Jack.  Partner ducked this.  Declarer then finessed the Jack of hearts, dropped the queen and cashed the Ace of hearts. Partner discarded the 7 of clubs (upside-down carding). Then, a heart to me on which partner discarded another club.

This is when I got sloppy.  I cashed a top club to let partner know to lead me back a spade and then lead a diamond. Partner won with the 10, cashed the Ace of diamonds and had no club to lead back to me!  I of course had the complete count of the hand -- partner must have 2 spades since they are playing 3NT and not 4S, and so he must have 3 clubs. He discarded two of those -- he had to be careful to not give away the position of the King of spades in case I had it.  So, cashing that club honor was poor form. Once I'd decided to cash it, not cashing the second club also was beyond the pale.

The second hand was a case of bad judgement.  I was West on this hand:

South opened 1C, I passed and North replied 1D (no, they are not playing Precision; North was simply being frisky). Partner bid 1S.  South doubled, North replied 2D over which partner bid 2S and South bid 3NT.  Sitting West, what do you lead?

I believed South, and believed that he had two stoppers in spades. I also believed that North had his 1D bid. So, with 7 points in my hand, partners spades didn't rate to be that solid (given the vulnerability, he'd have 7 or so points and 6 spades), I thought -- I put declarer with something like KJ9 of spades and partner with perhaps the J8 of clubs to go with his AQ of spades.  So, I led a club, and continued clubs when declarer immediately played the King of hearts.  Declarer then proceeded to drop my Jack of diamonds, and partner's solid spade suit vanished into thin air.

The third sloppy hand was a much simpler mistake.  When partner asked for keycards in hearts, I was West and replied 5D, showing zero.  The King of hearts is a keycard, and I had it.  We missed the slam, for another 10 imp loss:

Sloppiness on game-and-slam hands at IMPs is very costly.  In spite of these disasters, we somehow managed to hold on to win the match 79-76.  We'll take it!

Unblocking on defense

With many of the good players in Reno for the nationals, the field at a monthly Swiss club game was rather weak.  We lost imps on only two boards the entire night and since these were in separate matches, it didn't hurt our cakewalk.

See if you would get the defense right on this hand.  North deals and opens:

N    E    S     W

1D  P   1S     P

2H  P   2NT  P

3NT

I was sitting West, and held:

West (me)
♠ Q954
♥ AJ82
♦ AQ
♣ J75

Do you agree with  my bidding?  I debated doubling 1S (negative, showing hearts and clubs), but my flat hand was not very appealing and so I decided to sit out the auction.  After North reversed with 2H, I was glad I hadn't gotten involved.

So, now it's my lead.  What would you lead?  The choices (in my mind) were between a low heart and a club.  The problem with a heart is that it could blow a trick if their heart honors are split -- declarer can run it to the honor in his hand, and then finesse towards the honor in dummy.  So, I lead the five of clubs.

Dummy came down, and this what I saw:

Initially, I thought partner would have nothing, but it appears that they may have overbid this thing. Partner might have a king somewhere.

On the 5 of clubs, declarer played the 9 of clubs from dummy and partner contributed the 8 of clubs. Because neither attitude nor count is useful in clubs, I took that as suit preference.  So, when declarer led a diamond to the board, I hopped up with the Ace of diamonds and led a spade.  Declarer now took four club tricks, with both partner and me discarding an encouraging heart on the fourth club.

King of diamond, felling my queen and then a diamond to partner's Jack on which I discarded a low (encouraging) spade.  I was down to:

West (me)
♠ Q9
♥ AJ8
♦ 
♣ 

Partner now led the Jack of spades through declarer.  Declarer played the King.  What do you do?

I played the 9 of spades and was promptly endplayed when declarer exited to my queen after cashing a diamond (on which I threw the 8 of hearts).  He got his heart King to make 3NT.  I needed to unblock the Queen (the Jack should promise the 10 of spades) or discard it on the fourth diamond, and then I get partner to push a heart through.

Partner did well to lead the Jack of spades -- it would be required if I held the King and declarer the Queen in that suit.  Because I had the unblock available if I held the Queen instead (as here), the hearts could wait.

This was the full hand:

Dealer: N Vul: EW	North (dummy) ♠ A ♥ T964 ♦ K942 ♣ AKQ9
West (me) ♠ Q954 ♥ AJ82 ♦ AQ ♣ J75		East ♠ JT87 ♥ Q53 ♦ JT5 ♣ 864
	South ♠ K632 ♥ K7 ♦ 8763 ♣ T32
Bidding:	N E S W 1D P 1S P 2H P 2NT P 3NT	HTML Bridge Hand Layout Creator

The fewer the trumps ...

I was in Las Vegas on work, and decided to look up an old friend and catch an evening of bridge.  It was nice to see another Oklahoma exile and realize how far I'd come since the last time I'd played with him ...

We got to one poor 4-2 contract but, surprisingly, it turned out to be an average board because most others in our seats got to a poorer 5-1 one!  This was the hand:

Dealer: W Vul: EW	North ♠ A53 ♥ 9 ♦ AK1093 ♣ A965
West ♠ K2 ♥ AK54 ♦ J875 ♣ JT3		East ♠ QT76 ♥ J63 ♦ 64 ♣ KQ74
	South ♠ J984 ♥ QT872 ♦ Q2 ♣ 82
Bidding:	1D - P - 1S - P 1NT - P - P - X P - 2C - allpass	HTML Bridge Hand Layout Creator

After West opened 1D, partner (North) had no good bid and passed. East bid 1S and West bid 1NT.  This runs around to me (South).  What would you do in this situation?

I decided to double for takeout, and partner played the 4-2 fit in clubs.  Surprisingly, this turned out better than other tables' 2H doubled.  Their vulnerability argues for me to pass 1NT.  At least, I now know enough to not bid 2H in this situation -- West is very likely to have 4 hearts in this auction.  Five years ago, I'd have bid 2H.  Progress!

Talking of progress, I was very happy that I was able to make 6H-doubled on this hand.  See if you can find the line:

Dealer: N Vul: NS	North ♠ AK432 ♥ KJ54 ♦ T874 ♣
West ♠ 986 ♥ T863 ♦ K5 ♣ AKJ6		East ♠ T75 ♥ ♦ QJ62 ♣ Q97542
	South ♠ QJ ♥ AQ972 ♦ A93 ♣ T83
Bidding:	1S - P - 2H - P 4C - P - 4NT - P 5H - P - 6H - X allpass	HTML Bridge Hand Layout Creator

Partner's 4C was a splinter.  With my poor holding in clubs, I got excited and propelled towards 6H, which West doubled.  She then laid down the Ace of clubs.

What's your line? This is what I did:

• Ruff the club in dummy
• Low spade to Queen
• Ruff another club in dummy
• Jack of hearts, learning of the 4-0 break
• Low spade to Jack
• Ace of diamonds
• Ruff final club in dummy.  At this point, dummy has AKx of spades and three diamonds.  I have four hearts and two low diamonds.
• Ace of spades, throw a diamond
• King of spades, throw another diamond.  West ruffs, but that's it.

This depends on West having at least 3 spades.  Do you see a better line?

Forcing them

Playing in a sectional tournament, we had a horrible first session (47%) and a great second session (60%) to average out at an okay 54%.  Going back and looking at the near-zeroes in the first session, I notice that I got a couple of defenses wrong, and got suitably punished.

See if you would do better in the West seat.

Here is one board:

♠ Q J 10 4♥ 7 2♦ K 9 3♣ Q 10 3 2

♠ A 8 6 5♥ A 10 5 3♦ J 7 2♣ 7 6

♠ 2♥ K J 9 8 6 4♦ Q 8 6 5 4♣ K

♠ K 9 7 3♥ Q♦ A 10♣ A J 9 8 5 4

North is declaring 4S after partner (East) opened 2H and South doubled for takeout.  I furthered the preempt by bidding 3H and North bid 4S.

East leads the 8 of hearts and after taking the Ace of hearts, what do you do?

At the table, I led back a club and N-S wrapped up 11 tricks.  Holding 4 spades, I needed to be thinking about a forcing defense. I should lead back a heart (!) making South ruff once.  Then, when declarer is pulling trumps, I should duck twice, take the third spade and lead another heart, forcing North to ruff. At that point then, South will have give me another spade trick.

Most of the field was not in 4S, so holding them to 4S would still have been below average, but as it was, letting them make 5S was a bottom.

This was the second defensive board I didn't get right:

♠ Q 4 2♥ K 8 3♦ J 8♣ A Q 10 9 2

♠ 9 8♥ 10 9 4♦ 10 9 2♣ K J 7 6 3

♠ K 10 5 3♥ A Q J 6♦ Q 6 5♣ 8 4

♠ A J 7 6♥ 7 5 2♦ A K 7 4 3♣ 5

North opened 1C, partner doubled for takeout and N-S had a tortured auction to 2S (North bid 1C, East doubled, South bid 1S, North bid 2C, South bid 2D and North bid 2S, all-pass).

Sitting West, what do you lead?

At the table, I thought I needed to cut down on ruffs and led a spade.

This is bad for several reasons: one is that my clubs and partner's diamonds are in finessing positions, so declarer doesn't need ruffs.  Second, the auction implies a 4-3 fit, and so partner has 4 spades. I need to lead the 10 of hearts so we can take our tricks, and let declarer navigate the bad split with no throw-in suit.

Both of these hard to defend, but I had the clues in the auction to make the right lead at the table.