[helium]

Hi all. here is a defence probelm i want to see how you handle:))

playing teams you have this hand:

Scoring: IMP

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and bidding goes- 1♠-pass-3♠-all pass.


p lead ace, king, queen and a small♦

Scoring: IMP

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what do you play on the 2-3 and 4th D?? how should the def go?


its not so hard but i guess its a adv/expert problem.


kenneth

[flytoox]

Ruff with SA, and return club.

[inquiry]

Ruff with spade ace and return a spade...

But, really, on hands like this we need to see the spots. What do we know...

We can see 25 hcp (partners nine in ♦, dummies 8, and our own 8). That leaves a maximum of 15 for declarer...but we guess he would have bid game with 15. If partner has the club king, declare can hook it, he can hook our heart, and it looks like he can come to sufficient tricks (two heart ruffs, two hearts, two clubs, and four spades in his hand.,, with an extra club in the bag too...).

Your best chance is if partner has S-Jxx or S-Qx... ruff with the ace establishes a trick for him. The turmp return is in case WEST is KQJxx AJxxx Dxxx void. Now he has 1H, 2H ruff, 1C, and 4S still one trick short....

Ben

[Free]

I would discard a ♥ and a ♣ on the ♦KQ, and ruff the 4th ♦ with the ♠A, continuing with ♠ to shorten dummy.

[ArcLight]

Would there be a way for pard to play AKQ to show how many ♦ he has?
That way we would know if our little trump would ruff (as opposed to being over ruffed if pard has 5 diamonds). Can pard let us know he has 4 Diamonds by the way he plays his top diamonds?

In that case we can take 3♦, a ruff, and then play the ♠A for the setting trick. This yields us 2 trump tricks,a s does the other line of play with the Ace ruff, and the trump promotion.

[flytoox]

ArcLight, on Jan 14 2005, 02:44 PM, said:

Would there be a way for pard to play AKQ to show how many ♦ he has?
That way we would know if our little trump would ruff (as opposed to being over ruffed if pard has 5 diamonds). Can pard let us know he has 4 Diamonds by the way he plays his top diamonds?

In that case we can take 3♦, a ruff, and then play the ♠A for the setting trick. This yields us 2 trump tricks,a s does the other line of play with the Ace ruff, and the trump promotion.

Declarer is unlikely to have 5422. If he has this shape, he may bid game. I think he is 5332 99.9% of the time. Precisely, he has doulbeton C. Otherwise, pd, holding 55 red suits, would take some action i think.

[kgr]

inquiry, on Jan 14 2005, 02:33 PM, said:

Your best chance is if partner has S-Jxx or S-Qx... ruff with the ace establishes a trick for him. The turmp return is in case WEST is KQJxx AJxxx Dxxx void. Now he has 1H, 2H ruff, 1C, and 4S still one trick short....

..He will make 5 Spades and his contract.

How do you know your partner has 4 or 5 card ♦?
With my regular partner I ruff low. He would certainly have overcalled with ♦ AKQxx and f.i. ♠ Qx.
I expect he has 4 card ♦

[Fluffy]

I have an ageement to lead Q from AKQx, but I supose it is not on.

partner could easilly have only a Q left if it is ♥Q our only chance of defeat will be that he has 4♦, he has returned low ♦ wich is also consistent with having only 4.

If he has ♠Q, he probably has it third, so may ruff with anything
If he has ♠J, he we need to ruff with the Ace.
If he has ♣K (consistent with low ♦ and 5♦) declarer has easy 9 tricks on many ways.

So I will ruff low covering mroe situations imo.

[Winstonm]

This could be wrong but here goes. My evaluation: We are missing 15HCP outside of diamonds. If declarer had all 15 surely he would have bid 4S. Therefore, partner must have at minimum 1 of the missing cards. (If not we're not beating this anyway. If pard had a stiff club he would have played a low diamond the third time in to force me to ruff and find the club switch) If pard has an Ace, it doesn't matter what I do as declarer should go down. If pard has the club K it is onside and declarer will be able to come to 4 spades, heart A (and queen if he elects to finesse) at least 1 heart ruff in dummy and 2 clubs for 9 tricks.

Seems like the only chance to beat this is if partner holds the Q or J of spades.
If partner holds Qxx, my play is irrelevant. The only time my play is critical is when partner holds Qx or Jxx. (If I ruff low and get overruffed, declarer can pick up the trumps for 1-loser. Same is true if I don't ruff.)

My play is to pitch 1 low club and 1 low heart, hoping and encouraging partner to continue with diamonds, even if declarer began with 3. On the 4th diamond, I ruff with the Ace of spades. This establishes our 4th trick and establishes a trick for partner's hoped for Qx or Jxx. No matter how declarer squirms and twists after this play, he must lose another trump trick.

WinstonM