[daveharty]

My partner and I were scuffling. You know the kind of session: the cards seemed to be running the other way, so you're defending a lot, and you need some help from the opponents...not much scope to do anything. There was still time, though; we could go either way...

Then came the round that detonated our game.

We sat down against two ladies who could charitably be described as "not very intimidating." RHO in particular was so nervous that her hands were visibly shaking as she removed her cards from the board. Time to make a move, I thought.

Board 1
In second seat, nobody vulnerable, I picked up this uninspiring collection: ♠T54 ♥Q92 ♦T73 ♣J432. RHO opened 1♣; I passed; LHO bid 2♦. My partner knew better than to ask what this meant during a live auction, and contented himself with a 2♥ overcall. RHO passed, as did I; LHO was there with a smooth 3♦. Partner passed, and RHO started thinking. And thinking. Finally, she shrugged, and bid 3NT, which became the final contract.

"What was 2♦?" I asked RHO.

"Um...I think she has a lot of diamonds."

"Is it weak? Strong? Somewhere in the middle?"

"Um...I think she has a pretty good hand."

I led the ♥2, and dummy came down with: ♠63 ♥J ♦AJ98654 ♣AT7. Dummy's jack was taken by my partner's King, declarer playing the 3. Partner thought for a while and switched to the ♠K. Declarer brightened a bit, and won the Ace. She played the ♦K; 7, 4, 2. She then played the ♣5 toward the board; I played the deuce. She went into the tank again; finally, she inserted the ten! When this held, she shrugged again, and played the ♦A, felling my partner's queen, as she pitched a low spade. She then played the ♦J, visibly holding her breath while she waited for my card. When it turned out to be the elusive ten-spot, she exhaled loudly and smiled. She proceeded to run the rest of the tricks. My partner ground his teeth as the whole hand proved to be:

---

Board 2
In third seat, all vulnerable, I picked up another fine specimen: ♠642 ♥6 ♦KQ532 ♣K764. Partner opened 1♣; RHO smoothly overcalled 1♦. Since I wasn't going to sit for a reopening double, and the hand looked better for suit play than notrump, I decided to bid a simple 2♣; surprisingly (to me), this ended the auction. RHO led a low diamond. Partner studied the dummy and gave a bemused glance in RHO's direction, raising an eyebrow. He played low from dummy, fetching the jack from LHO...and winning the ace in his hand. I could almost hear his scornful Nice diamonds, lady in my head. He proceeded to scramble six tricks for -200, as the hand turned out to be:

---

Board 3
Finally, as dealer, at unfavorable, I picked up a good hand: ♠AJ96 ♥KT4 ♦AQ63 ♣AK. I opened 2NT; partner raised to 3NT. Easy peasy! I thought. Now let's show 'em how to declare a hand!

LHO led the ♣Q, and I saw there was some work to do:

---

I agreed with partner's decision not to use Stayman with his quacky 4333 hand, but it looked like it was wrong here; 4♠ looked to be easier. Ah well, I thought, Nothing to do about that now...let's see. I need the spade finesse, which gives me four spade tricks, two clubs, and a diamond...if I play a diamond up, that will get me two extra diamond tricks any time diamonds are 3-3 or LHO has Kx. There is also the chance that she ducks from Kxx or Kxxx, and with an extra diamond in the bank, I can set up a couple of hearts...let's give it a try. I played a diamond toward the dummy. LHO played the 4, and dummy's Jack fetched the King from RHO. She played a club, which I won in hand. Now I clearly needed RHO to have the ♥A, since hearts were my only entry to the dummy to take the spade finesse, so I held my breath and led a heart to the Jack, RHO winning the Ace. Whew, I thought, but my relief was short-lived, as she switched to...a spade. Hoping against hope, I played low, but LHO won the King, and laid down the ♣J. It never rains, I thought, and studied my hand to decide how I was going to discard on the deluge of clubs. Then something struck me: the ♠6 looked odd. In fact, it looked a lot like the ♣6...I had missorted my hand! I sheepishly followed suit to the third round of clubs, and meekly went down two. Not only was 3NT the normal contract, but it was fairly easy after ducking the first club. The entire hand was:

---

Matchpoints
Board 1: 0
Board 2: 1 (some poor sod got to 3♣, down several.)
Board 3: 0

"Well," said my partner philosophically as we walked glumly away from the table, "at least we found our level."

Disclaimer: Sticklers will notice that the dealer and vulnerability conditions given are impossible. I took a little license in presenting the boards out of order, and omitting the fourth board of the round, which was really boring. Nevertheless, all of the boards occurred as written.

[Phil]

Hand diagrams in spoiler boxes aren't working - at least in Chrome.

[Phil]

I love hand 3. Seems the lighting in purgatory is about 10 lumens.

[daveharty]

Phil, on 2012-August-25, 10:42, said:

Hand diagrams in spoiler boxes aren't working - at least in Chrome.

Hmm, that's weird. I'll take out the spoiler tags...I was just trying to keep it brief.

[jonottawa]

Great story. As I read it, I felt there was no way it was completely true, and sure enough ... but 'Don't let the truth get in the way of a good story.'

[bluecalm]

Nice story and good read but 2C bid at matchpoints is very bad imo.

[rmnka447]

Sometimes, you eat the bear, sometimes the bear ...

Everyone has had those nights when things don't go well.

Hand 1 was a fix. Once the 2 ♦ bid was made, you weren't getting a good board.

Hand 2 was also a fix in a way. I don't think there are going to be many good players who will overcall 1 ♦ with your RHO opponent's hand with red pockets. It looks like you're sort of stuck once that bid occurs. But your hand does have some defensive prospects against a ♦ contract. You know that between your hand and overcaller's hand there are at least 10 diamonds. So the question is whether you compete immediately or wait to see what develops. Your choices are between 1 NT, 2 ♣, and Pass. There's just no way to know what's right because you don't know what kind of hand partner has. With so many minor cards in your hand, it seems more likely partner will hold the majors than long ♣s. If partner does hold ♣, then the opponents must have a big fit somewhere in a major. Pass has the additional advantage that LHO may bid and clarify what's going on. I'm not sure it's right but something to consider. Pay your money and take your choice. This time, you bid 2 ♣ and it didn't work out. Big deal, next time it may work out better.

Hand 3 is the kind of mechanical error everyone makes from time to time. We all hate to have them occur, but better at a session that's not going your way than one where you are close to winning.


As long as you and your partner aren't tossing a lot of boards to the opponents, you have to accept that sometime you can't win or even place because of what the opponent's do. In those sessions, all you can do is to continue to grind out whatever results you can get. But you should not get upset with, angry at, or second guess your partner. That will never help your game. If you avoid that, you'll find that sometimes as bad as the results seem, others struggled as much or more and you'll end up winning or scratching.

[Quantumcat]

Enjoyable reading. Post more stories