[sathyab]

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(Hand rotated for convenience) 2♠ shows a weak hand with ♠s and a minor. You get a helpful ♠T for a lead. As your teammates don't play weak two-suiter openings you suspect your counterpart will probably be in 4♥, making a draw on the board unlikely. Plan your play. Anytime you play ♥s RHO plays the Q first.

[bigbenvic]

My first thought is to test clubs, play small from dummy, win in hand, H to the table and play 6♣ to the T. If both honours offside, I should still get 3S 3H 2D & 2C for 10 tricks, if 1 or both onside I'll get 11 and may be able to pressure W if he has the reds and E has the blacks. If the T holds I'll concede a club before applying pressure on W.

As hard as it is to pick Easts minor, I think that ♣ is slightly more likely than ♦, K8xxx Q QJxxx xx seems uglier than K8xxx Q xx KJxxx and the first might just be a pass at red, the second I'd be happier to open.

[phil_20686]

This hand just seems to depend too much on what the defense does.

I would cover with the spade Q, as if rho doesn't cover my entry position has improved. If that holds I will run the CQ.

If he does cover, I think we have no choice but to win in hand and start with a Club to the Q. Even though I agree RHO is more likely to have clubs, crossing in hearts at this stage feels wrong, I will still pick up almost as many club holdings by playing low to the Q and then low to the ten assuming that it loses.

[sathyab]

bigbenvic, on 2011-December-08, 05:23, said:

My first thought is to test clubs, play small from dummy, win in hand, H to the table and play 6♣ to the T. If both honours offside, I should still get 3S 3H 2D & 2C for 10 tricks, if 1 or both onside I'll get 11 and may be able to pressure W if he has the reds and E has the blacks. If the T holds I'll concede a club before applying pressure on W.

As hard as it is to pick Easts minor, I think that ♣ is slightly more likely than ♦, K8xxx Q QJxxx xx seems uglier than K8xxx Q xx KJxxx and the first might just be a pass at red, the second I'd be happier to open.

How do you make more than 2♣ tricks when 1 one honor is onside ? Say you lead the ♣6 from dummy toward hand and play the Nine losing to the Jack. Next you will play the A from hand, Q from dummy and let's say RHO plays the K. You have the Ten and four of ♣ left in your hand which is good for one more trick. So you make only two ♣ tricks in all.

[gnasher]

I don't agree that RHO is more likely to have clubs than diamonds. If he has clubs, his pips are quite poor, whereas it's possible for him to have good diamond pips. For this purpose, QJ98x is a better suit than KJ8xx.

I'll win the spade in hand, then play a club to the queen. Then:

- If ♣Q wins, I'll assume RHO has diamonds. Take another spade finesse, cash two diamonds, then play a club to the 10. If LHO has xx Q109x xx KJxxx I'll endplay him twice and make 11 tricks. (On the actual layout, only one endplay is needed.)

- If LHO takes ♣K, I'll follow a similar line: take ♣Q, a spade finesse, ♥A, ♦AK and play a heart. If RHO has two hearts or singleton queen, I play them from the top to endplay LHO for eleven; if he has a small singleton I make only ten.

- If ♣Q loses to the king, I'll assume RHO has clubs. Win the return, give up a club trick to East, then cash my black-suit winners to squeeze or strip-squeeze West.

[sathyab]

gnasher, on 2011-December-08, 13:05, said:

I don't agree that RHO is more likely to have clubs than diamonds. If he has clubs, his pips are quite poor, whereas it's possible for him to have good diamond pips. For this purpose, QJ98x is a better suit than KJ8xx.

I'll win the spade in hand, then play a club to the queen. Then:

- If ♣Q wins, I'll assume RHO has diamonds. Take another spade finesse, cash two diamonds, then play a club to the 10. If LHO has xx Q109x xx KJxxx I'll endplay him twice and make 11 tricks. (On the actual layout, only one endplay is needed.)

- If LHO takes ♣K, I'll follow a similar line: take ♣Q, a spade finesse, ♥A, ♦AK and play a heart. If RHO has two hearts or singleton queen, I play them from the top to endplay LHO for eleven; if he has a small singleton I make only ten.

- If ♣Q loses to the king, I'll assume RHO has clubs. Win the return, give up a club trick to East, then cash my black-suit winners to squeeze or strip-squeeze West.

If someone tells you that a ♣ to Q would lose to the K on your right, but that ♣ length is on your left, what would you do different ?

[sathyab]

This is the quintessential 3nt vs 4M hand. With all the help in the bidding, it looks like you should be able to squeeze or end-play LHO in ♥ and his long suit. I have no idea how to determine what his long suit is. There were suggestions to win in hand, play a ♣ toward Q and if it loses, assume RHO's second suit is ♣s. That turns out to be wrong. Also, even looking at all four hands it's not clear whether or not to cover the ♠T with the Queen. Do the wrong thing and defense can prevail fairly easily, for the full hand turns out to be:

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Here's the play for 11 tricks. Win the first trick in hand. ♥K next looking to drop Q or T9 from RHO. Once he plays the Q, play the ♦A followed by a ♦ to the Ten. The idea is to strip-squeeze LHO in the rounded suits without count. You have to force him to discard two ♣s, once on the 3rd round of ♠s and another time on the 3rd round of ♦s.

Win RHO's ♦ return in dummy, discarding a small ♥ while LHO is forced to discard a ♣. Two rounds of ♠ ending in hand, as LHO is forced to part with one more ♣. Now a ♥ to dummy's Ace, ♣Q, K, A, small. Now LHO has only Jx of ♣ left along with the T9 of ♥s while you have the stiff ♥J and T9x of ♣s. Establish all your ♣s by playing the Ten and ♥J is the entry.

If you had covered the ♠T with the Q at T1 and followed the same line of play, RHO returns a ♠ when you duck a ♦ to him. You have to get to dummy with a ♥ to play the 3rd round of ♦ to squeeze LHO. But when you pitch a ♥, LHO pitches a ♥ too, as the suit is blocked and you can't squeeze him any more.

[gnasher]

If you'd covered the spade at trick one you could still do it, by endplaying LHO twice; ♥K; diamond to dummy; ♣Q to the king and ace; cash the top diamonds and spades; ♣J.

If LHO ducks that, you play three rounds of hearts, endplaying him to give you a third club trick.

Hence he has to take the club. Now, though, he is forced to weaken one of his round-suit holdings, returning either ♥10 or ♣8. You win and endplay him with the other suit, forcing him to lead into your tenace. It's not often that you endplay someone to give you a trick with a 4.

[sathyab]

gnasher, on 2011-December-23, 06:14, said:

If you'd covered the spade at trick one you could still do it, by endplaying LHO twice; ♥K; diamond to dummy; ♣Q to the king and ace; cash the top diamonds and spades; ♣J.

If LHO ducks that, you play three rounds of hearts, endplaying him to give you a third club trick.

Hence he has to take the club. Now, though, he is forced to weaken one of his round-suit holdings, returning either ♥10 or ♣8. You win and endplay him with the other suit, forcing him to lead into your tenace. It's not often that you endplay someone to give you a trick with a 4.

You meant to say ♣T, not J, I think after cashing ♥K, 3 ♠s and two high ♦s and ♣Q, K, A, 3.

LHO has ♥T97 ♣J87 left in the 6-card ending. When you the ♣T, he simply takes the J and returns one. You have nothing left with which to end-play him, as he out-spots you in both rounded suits.

[gnasher]

Oh yes. That's annoying - I really liked my ending.