October 22, 2013

I was a bit disappointed with Sunday’s play.  There were too many card play errors, and the bidding, by both sides, but particularly by East-West, was much too conservative.  Aggressive bidding won’t always work out, but winning bridge players are seldom shy turtles in the auction!

The match started out with back-to-back seven IMP swings from missed games, caused by overly conservative views in the bidding.  Then came board five:  At favorable vulnerability, you pick up:

Would you open with three spades?  Sure, why not.  The suit isn’t great, but you do have seven of them, and the vulnerability screams for a preempt.  At the table, the player in front of this opened two clubs, strong and artificial.  Okay, you are out-gunned, but it is still right to preempt.  Three spades seems pretty clear here as well – indeed I know players who would bid four spades over a strong opening. 

Here was the full hand:

Neither West bid at all.  So North-South had an unimpeded auction to four hearts, by North.  Four spades looks like a good save, down two when North can overruff the third round of clubs.  In theory, it was better to defend, since four hearts is down on the diamond ace lead, a diamond continuation, a low spade to the king, and another ruff.  In practice, that silence cost at least eight IMPs, when four hearts made easily. 

A few boards later, South held:

South opened one heart, and rebid only two hearts after a one spade response.  That was a bad underbid – as little as AKxx xx xxxx xxx, and game is excellent, but partner would never bid over two hearts. 

Over two hearts, North raised to four, and South, holding a much better hand than advertised, had a new problem.  Ten tricks could easily be the limit opposite many hands, but there are also many North hands where slam is good.  I guess I would take a chance and raise to five hearts.  Our South, feeling guilty about the first under-bid, Blackwooded and bid a slam.  North, in fact, held:

Six was cold, and seven an excellent contract (but very hard to bid.  If South bids three hearts the first time, North may well key-card, but might quit in six off the trump queen.  After such a start at the other table, North gambled a bit and tried seven).  Think about how you would play seven hearts, on a trump lead.  More on that later.

Finally, on board 13, East-West held:

At the other table, in fourth seat, West opened with two clubs, and they bid smoothly to six hearts.  Well-done.  I can’t imagine not opening this powerhouse with two clubs, but our West started with one club, and settled for four hearts over a one heart response. 

Not all conservative bids get punished.  Trumps didn’t split, so this auction won IMPs.  It should have won quite a lot more in the play, for here was the full hand:

The auction, with both sides vulnerable, was:

  
South led the spade king, and shifted to a diamond.  How should the hand be played?

Trumps certainly aren’t splitting, but even a five-zero split can be overcome with those great clubs.  Since the goal is to lead clubs and clubs and clubs through North, you should maintain a diamond entry to dummy and win the diamond in your hand.  Then heart to the ace, finding out the bad news, and clubs.  Even a four-one club split can be handled – say the hand looked like this:

Win the diamond ace, trump, two high clubs, as North ruffs.  Ruff the spade return, trump a club, trump to dummy, and run club winners. 

With clubs splitting, declarer would end up with eleven tricks, +990.  Unfortunately, declarer won the diamond king, still not fatal, but trumped a diamond in dummy late in the day.  When North over-ruffed and played a spade, four hearts had to go down a trick.  Since six hearts was doubled, and down -500 at the other table, this still gained seven IMPs.  It should have been +16 IMPs. 

Time for a play problem, from the other room.  On board eight, South declared three diamonds after a weak-notrump opening and transfer response:

   
The auction was, with no one vulnerable:

 

Transferring to a J-fifth suit at the three level looks wrong to me – I would simply pass one notrump, but the contract was fine.  Plan the play on the spade queen lead.

Counting losers – there are the two top trumps to lose, and a slow spade and heart.  Four losers.  As for winners – three eventual trump tricks, two spades, two clubs, and the heart ace.  Eight winners.  You need one more. 

The obvious place to try for trick nine is with a heart ruff in hand.  So, one possible line is to win the spade and duck a heart immediately.  Can the defense stop this ruff?  Most likely, by playing three rounds of trumps.  Then what? 

You might set up clubs, but you will need a lucky split there.  Maybe this is the full hand:

 

Declarer wins the spade in dummy, and ducks a heart.  East wins the nine, and plays trumps.  South wins the third trump and tries a club to the jack and queen.  East continues spades, and the spotlight is on South.  The winning line is to cross to the heart ace and lead a club to the nine.  More likely, South will play clubs from the top and go down a trick.  Unlucky? 

No, poor planning.   North should win the spade king at trick one, but South should trump a club in dummy before ducking a heart.  See what a huge difference that makes? 

To stop the heart ruff, the defense must play three rounds of trumps.  But South simply wins that third trump, ruffs another club, and crosses to the spade ace to score the long club. 
The full hand turned out to be this:

With trumps four-one, the clubs won’t set up, but the trumps are blocked, so the defense can’t stop the heart ruff.  Three diamonds was cold, yet set at the table.

The contract at our table was a more normal 1NT by North.  East led hearts, won by North with the ace on the third round.  At this point, it was quite clear that hearts were 3-5, so the defense seemed to have six winners set up.  No problem, simply go after diamonds and that’s all they’ll take.  In the mean-time, North-South will set up three diamond winners to go with the five top tricks.  An easy and obvious +90. 

Not so fast.  After winning the third heart, North played a spade to the ace and a club to the jack, giving up another trick to the defense.  But, here, too, the diamonds were blocked, so the defense could win only one club, four hearts, and one diamond.  When the club ten dropped, we were back to +90. 

On to board 10.  North opened a strong notrump and bid quickly to the 3NT game:

 

There are plenty of winners, but, after a normal club opening lead, five losers.  So, 3NT off a trick looks like the final outcome. 

East did, indeed, lead the club six, but West played the queen at trick one, denying the jack, and totally fooling partner.  This is very poor play – third hand usually plays high at trick one, but must play the lower of touching equals in positions like this.  If you play the jack, you may have the queen, but you completely deny the ten.  If you play the queen, you might hold the king, but you will never hold the jack (there are, naturally, subtle exceptions to such rules.  On some hands, you have to deceive partner to get partner to find the winning play later, but those exceptions are intentional deceptions – West’s play of the queen told partner “I do not have the club jack!”).  North won the ace, played a diamond to the king, and a diamond back, as West discarded the heart two, discouraging.  Despite this, East shifted to hearts, and payed out 630. 

East must take some of the blame here – once partner suggests nothing in hearts, declarer appears to have ten certain winners, four diamonds, four hearts, and two aces.  There is only one hope left, maybe declarer was dealt a hand like Qxx AKx Q98xx AJ.  So East should have tried the club king anyway, but West gets most of my boos.  Sunday’s play was, as I said, not very pleasing. 

Let’s finish off with that grand slam:

   

In the other room, after 1H – 1S, East overcalled with three diamonds.  South bid three hearts, and North drove to seven, after checking on key cards.  West led the trump six, to the five, queen, and ace.  Take over.  How would you land this grand?

At the table, declarer drew the other trump, and led a spade to the jack, essentially a 50-50 play (slightly better given the preempt).  Surely we could improve on this, can’t we?

Well, for starters, declarer could cash the spade ace before taking the finesse.  This lands the contract when the finesse works and also when East was dealt a singleton spade queen.  Not likely, but that adds another two percent or so to our winning chances.  Better yet, why not cash the spade ace, club king and club ace, and then try the spade finesse.  Maybe the club queen will drop.  That improves our chances to around 54%. 

We’re getting warmer.  The spade finesse can’t be any better than the club finesse.  Instead of relying on the spade hook, declarer could cash two high spades, and fall back on the club finesse.  This makes on half the club positions, or when the spade queen drops in two rounds.  This line works around 59% of the time. 

This is a common theme in bridge – Try to get lucky in one suit before relying on a favorable lie in another.  Combine your chances.

This is the right line of play in 7NT – try to drop the spade queen, and, if that fails, finesse for the club queen.  In hearts, however, we can do much better.  Spade ace and king, spade ruff, trump to dummy, spade ruff.  If the queen ever falls, claim.  Otherwise, take the club finesse.  This line actually lands our contract around 93% of the time.  That is much, much better than the finesse tried at the table. 

Are we done, or can we improve our odds even more? 

Mostly, we are done.  We can do slightly better in a very odd way.  Should West turn up with five spades to the queen, we won’t ever actually have to take the club finesse.  Suppose this is the full hand:

After testing spades, we can simply run all of our winners, coming down to this four card ending:

 

When we lead the last trump, West must discard another club, so the club queen will come up – no finesse needed.  This is called a “show-up” squeeze.  These are occasionally useful, since the squeeze works whenever the club queen is onside, and also when it is off-side doubleton.  That adds a tiny, tiny smidge to our overall chance of success.  This line also works on this layout, if we can keep track of the diamonds played:

Now the ending is likely to look like this:

 

When we lead the last trump, West throws another club, North the spade jack, and East?  East will have to throw the diamond king away, and, if we can remember that our diamond four is high, we have the rest!   Of course, if you are good enough to play the hand this way, and to recognize the power of the diamond four, then you don’t need my advice.  In fact, you can write next week’s column.