June 24, 2013 – Is Down One Good Bridge?

There is another bridge adage – down one is good bridge.  What does that mean?  Well, as you know, at IMPs, the odds favor bidding games fairly aggressively.  In a strong match, both teams will bid game contracts that are marginal, and, if the defense is sharp, many of these will be set.  So, when a number of thin games are bid, and set, the standard of play seems to be high – down a trick, high level bridge.

The hands last night were pretty wild, with lots of interesting bidding decisions.  Stan will have his hands full.  In contrast, there were almost no swings in the card play.  Only board two presented real play considerations, but there is enough there to keep us occupied for the week. 

Looking at the traveler, around 2/3 of the field bid to this 24 point four heart game:

 

 
This is one of those typical touch-and-go games bid at IMPs.  This was the auction at our table:

   
Before discussing the play, let’s consider our prospects.  Counting winners, we have three hearts, once the ace is dislodged, three diamonds, and two spades.  If hearts are three-two, we can easily trump something in dummy, or ruff the fourth diamond in hand, so nine winners seems pretty easy.  We need ten. 

Let’s count losers.  We are off two clubs and the trump ace, and we rate to lose a spade trick eventually.  So, we need to get rid of that spade loser to make our contract.  List three ways we might avoid a spade loser.

 

1. The spade queen and jack could be onside.  That’s not very likely, but, if the opening lead is the spade queen, say, that will go from unlikely to very probable.
2. We might develop a club winner to discard the ten of spades.
3.  We might win four diamond tricks and dump two spades. 

I will focus on 2 first.  How could we develop a club winner from

If we are playing the suit ourselves, we will need East to hold two honors.  If the suit is like this:

we win an extra trick by leading twice toward our queen (and putting up the queen if East plays low).  In contrast, if the suit looks like this:

  
or similarly if we swap the ace and king, we develop a trick by finessing East for the jack.  Finally, if the suit looks like this:

 
there is nothing we can do, provided East covers an honor with an honor, and plays the jack on the ten. 

Here is my conclusion:  We can build a club trick only when East has at least two honors.  If those are the ace and king, we can lead to the queen, if the honors are AJ or KJ, we should finesse, and run the ten (or lead low to the nine), then lead up toward our hand later.  Of the three cases, AK, AJ, KJ, finessing the jack is best twice, so that is the percentage play. 

Time to consider 3.  What is the best play to win four diamond tricks holding

There are two realistic choices:

 

1.  Cash the ace and lead the six to the ten, taking a finesse, or
2. Cash the ace, king and queen, and hope the jack drops.

Which is better?  You choose.

The finesse is a straight fifty-fifty shot.  It works half the time.  For the other, since there are seven diamonds out, someone will have more diamonds than their partner.  Playing diamonds from the top works if the diamond jack is with the player holding the fewest diamonds.  OK, who is more likely to hold the jack?  The player with the fewest diamonds or the player with the most?  Obviously the player with more diamonds, so option 2 is clearly less than fifty-fifty, making the finesse the best bet.

Good.  Let’s put this all together and form a play plan.  Let’s suppose that West leads a trump against four hearts, and that East wins the ace and returns the suit, with West following.  What is the best line of play?

First off, we may as well draw the remaining trump.  An extra trump in our hands isn’t of any use, and it would be a shame to set up the club queen, and then see someone trump it.  As we saw above, we have two chances to develop an extra winner – play on clubs, leading to our hand twice, or play on diamonds, finessing West for the diamond jack.  Which should we try?

Both!  So long as we try clubs first, we can always fall back on diamonds if that fails (but we won’t recover if we try diamonds first and the finesse loses.  The defenders will have at four tricks in).  Since we need to start clubs from dummy, make sure to win the third trump in dummy and lead a club.  Maybe the full hand looks like this:

Use the next button to follow the play to a successful conclusion.

Bridge hands are often decided by tempo.  To develop a club winner and discard a spade loser from dummy takes two club leads.  The defenders can establish their spade trick with two spade leads.  The first team to the gate wins.  If West had led a spade, or if East had won the heart ace and shifted to the spade four, the hand would be set. 

Or perhaps this is the full hand:

Our club play will fail, but the diamond finesse will work, and, after trying clubs, we’ll fall back on that.

I am going to continue with this hand in several veins.  Again, let’s assume you get a trump lead, but this time East plays low on the seven.  How should you continue?

Once again, it seems right to try to develop a club trick before relying on the diamonds.  If we continue trumps, the defenders might wake up and attack spades, gaining that crucial tempo advantage, so we should start on clubs now.  Our best play is to win the trump lead on the table and lead the club five, inserting the nine from hand.  If the nine loses to the jack, we will give up on clubs, knock out the heart ace, and hope to win a diamond finesse.  If the nine forces a big honor, we are in great shape, and should be able to develop a club for a spade discard.  Granted, we are not completely home, for the clubs could be like this:

but they aren’t.  How do I know that?

Wouldn’t you lead a high club if you were on opening lead with the ace and king of clubs?  When you don’t get the lead of a high club, the odds are about a gazillion-to-one that East has at least one of the big clubs.

Time to get a bit advanced.  I chose to lead the club five, and not the ten, for a very specific reason.  It doesn’t matter at all which club I play from dummy in terms of the suit, but there are some funny psychological issues here.  I want to find out if the club jack is onside before the defense attacks spades.  Suppose the full hand looks like this:

If East has both minor suit jacks, I have to play on clubs to make the hand, but if West has both minor suit jacks, I need to rely on diamonds.  So, I win the trump on dummy, and lead a club, but East flies with the king and shifts to the spade four.  If I continue clubs and West has the jack, another spade does me in.  If I quit on clubs, I have messed up when East has both jacks. 

This excellent defense would really put it to me.  Fortunately, very few defenders are that good.  Most defenders trudge along following simple rules like third hand high, and cover an honor with an honor.  It would never occur to them to rise with the king if I lead the five from the table, but, if I call for the ten, they might play the king, simply covering an honor with an honor.  This funny psychology works very well – play low if you don’t want them to play an honor, and lead an honor if you want them to cover. 

I have played in many a poor slam, with a trump suit like

 
and with a potential side suit loser.  But that loser turned out to be immaterial, since the trump play went jack, king, ace, queen!  I saw a slam come home once with this trump suit around the table:

The jack was led from the table, and four big honors made up that trick. 

In our next variant, imagine that West leads the club four against four hearts.  East wins the king, and shifts to the spade four to the queen and king.  What next?

This is easy.  We don’t normally underlead aces in suit contracts, so East almost certainly has the club ace.  Lead another club and set up the queen for a discard.

Onward.  This time West leads the club four to East’s ace.  Again, a spade comes back.  So, this one is tricky.  We can finesse East for the club jack now, or we can finesse West for the diamond jack later.  We may not have time to try both.  If we take a losing club finesse, the defenders will set up their spade before we have knocked out the trump ace, and we won’t have time to run four diamond tricks.  Your choice – do you play another club, or a trump?

There is nothing to choose between the two finesses.  They are both fifty-fifty shots.  Still, it is better to rely on the diamond finesse, and play a trump.  Half the time, East will have the trump ace, and, thanks to the spade ten in dummy, East can’t play another spade.  If this is the full hand, where the club finesse is the winner,

  
we will still have time to test the clubs before trying diamonds. 

At every table, including ours, the opening lead against four hearts was the nine of spades.  This put the defense ahead in the spade-club race, so there was only one hope for the contract.  Declarer has to knock out the heart ace and hope for four diamond winners. 

Let’s try one more variation.  You win the spade lead in dummy and start on trumps, winning both the first and second round, as East discards a club.  So trumps are 4-1.  Now what?

You still need four diamond tricks, and need them now.  If you continue trumps, West can win and play a fourth round, and no luck in diamonds will help.  You need the full hand to look something like this:

   
Ace of diamonds, diamond to the ten, two more diamonds, throwing spades, spade ace, spade ruff high, and you have your ten tricks.  There is no other hope.

At the table, trumps were three-two.  West would win the first or second round and continue spades.  So, declarer has to draw the last trump and get lucky in diamonds.  Remember my introduction?  Is down one good bridge?  Not on this hand.  A strong declarer would draw the last trump, then play diamond ace, diamond to the ten.  That lands the contract, or leads to two down.  So here, down two seems like good bridge.  This was the full hand:

After the good spade lead, the contract is fated to go down, and down two tricks if played well.  But, if you peek at the traveler, no declarer went down two tricks.  Four hearts was made about half the time, including at our table, when West won the ace of hearts and attacked clubs, instead of continuing spades.  The actual layout makes this look like a poor defense, but I approve.  Let’s change around one tiny little card and have the hand look like this:

 
In this layout, with diamonds ready to run, the defense has to cash their clubs.  Is there any way to tell?  Perhaps.  I think West should lay down the ace of clubs.  In the second diagram, East should encourage, but, on the actual layout, with diamonds locked up, East should discourage and get partner to go back to spades.

At our table, West shifted to the club three, not the ace.  East won the king and might have returned to spades, giving the defense some chances, but East returned the club jack, setting up the nine for a discard.