Trumpace

I never disputed that, I agree with you here. In fact I think running the club 9 on the first club trick could be the best play. (Though seems like the majority opinion is to cash the ♣A and then play a ♣ to Q...) I was disputing the cashing of ♦A before ducking a club. Also, why do you always assume a ♥ return? A ♦ return seems more probable to me... (as a heart return seems to do no good to defense.. it is too late to set up a heart trick)

Why not duck a club immediately after drawing the second trump? That way you have 3 spade entries to dummy (2 diamond ruffs and high enough spade). In your line, if instead of a ♥ defenders return a ♦ you might lose an entry to dummy prematurely. Also, once defense has won a club trick, I see no point in them attacking hearts. If defense gets in to cash a heart, the contract is already down... It is probably better to attack dummy's entries.

Even if it is a 1% slam, it does not make the bid "horrid" unless you also consider the state of the match (and perphaps other conditions). Maybe that was the last hand and a desperate swing was needed...

How does running the ♣9 fare wrt to cashing the ♣A and low to Q?

I was kibitzing some experts this morning and this hand came up: [hv=d=e&v=e&n=sqj642h63d5c98653&s=sa9853ha9daj6caq4]133|200|Scoring: IMP[/hv] Bidding went 1S-4S-6S (East/West were passing through out). (South bid 1S) Opening lead was the spade 7, you play the ♠Q and it is covered by the K. What do you do next? How would you play if the opening lead was a ♥?

I am pretty sure the correct answer would have been posted by now, still I will give it a try. It looks like you need diamonds 3-2 and hearts 5-3 and Club Q with West. Win the ♥Q and play a spade up to the Q or J. If this is ducked, play on diamonds and make your contract. If RHO wins this and cashes hearts, throw 2 spades and a club from dummy. 2 clubs from hand or (1 club and 1 spade). It is necessary that there is at least one entry to both hand and dummy. For that reason leave the ♦K and ♦A alone. For instance, if say, you cash ♦A,Q before playing a spade to the Q, RHO will win, cash his hearts and stick you in dummy with a diamond. You are now cut off from the Spade K. If you cash the ♦K and the the ♠Q, after RHO wins the hearts, you will be stuck in hand with a spade lead.

As a defensive problem, can we think of a reason for East to shift to heart at trick 2 (after seeing the hands and the bidding, of course)?

Don't agree. Playing a club on your own could cost as good defence can then make 4 trumps and 2 diamonds. Say you play AK of hearts and ruff and play a club. West ruffs,leads a diamond to east, club ruff, diamond to east, club ruff plus A of spades that is the 6th trick for defence. I think South played correctly by spade to K on the first trick. But South should now ruff a heart and revert to clubs.

Hindi: ♠ Kaala paan ♥ Laal paan ♦ Eeth ♣ Chidi kaala paan literally means black betel leaf. laal paan is red betel leaf. eeth means a brick. chidi means a bird.

From the hands, it looks like N/S would know that they have all the aces when 6S gets doubled. Since a double (either lightener or just on plain trump stack) points to bad breaks in _some_ suit, 6NT could/will be bid by them and they will end up making it. (East is not sure that 6NT is going down) If the bidding points to a suit contract then a double might be ok.

Eeks! Even if you make the right play on every hand, you rate to go down _sometime_ (unless it is a 100% contract)! Don't let this hand give you a bad lesson!

1) Pass: spades 2+1, hearts zero, diamonds zero, clubs 3 and spades 3 points. That is 9 points. Pass. 2) Pass: I don't even know what cards I hold, better not risk bidding. Pass. 3) 1NT: woweee.. so many points. two no trump. click click. 1NT. 4) Pass: I am no better than my partner, plus I don't want to be blamed. 5) 3NT: Aah, 9 points against a 1NT opener, and look at those spots. 3NT. 6) Pass: Mums the word. 7) 6NT: Oops. Misclick bid 1NT. better bid a grand now. seven no trump. click click. 6NT.

Good point, although if they're in a 9-card fit then partner won't be able to lead that trump. Yes, but the bidding will probably point to a 9 card fit. Anyway, what to lead depends on the bidding and what you hold... so there is no hard and fast rule...

You have it backwards. If you don't have a side entry it is better to lead low from Axx, so that when partner gets in he can lead a trump which you win and lead the third trump. (and if you have Axxx, a forcing lead might be better) If you have a sure side entry then A followed by small might be better. (as that draws two trumps from dummy right off the bat). Leading low might not work in the cases where declarer needs just k-1 ruffs (k being the trump length in dummy) and can do so without losing the lead.

What if East puts the ♥9 on the third diamond? Now you have to ruff with the T. Now the 4th diamond can get overruffed with the ♥8 and in the end you might be forced to lead from the ♥AQ. (Haven't thought out completely).

If you are not sure about a hand, it is better to post it in the advanced section, especially if you are intermediate: 1) It might actually be an advanced hand 2) You get more accurate/correct responses from the experts who lurk there. 3) Very few experts/advanced players respond to threads in the B/I forum. 4) It could be dangerous bridge to form conclusions based on discussions not involving even one expert. Luckily for us, the few experts who respond to the B/I threads seem to really care about explaining correct bridge clearly.

what was the lead? Assuming a spade was led, it seems like KJ tight clubs seems to be the only hope for 3 club tricks. So I guess after winning the ♠A, play a diamond to K. Assuming West wins... you now have to play for ♣KJ tight. If West ducks, you are in soup. Does East have the ♦A and you can then try clubs for 2 tricks (as we have 2 diamond tricks) or go for 3 club tricks... (I guess 2 club tricks offers more chances?) No matter how you play it looks like down to me. If the diamond 9 was led and you ducked the first trick... a heart shift might do you in now. So you win (can bear 4-2/5-1 diamond split if clubs come in) and play clubs for 3 tricks.. play ♣A and small. Are you sure this is a BIL hand? You have managed to confuse me successfully :-)

I think i will go for the diamonds to be 3-2 with Q being in the doubleton hand. East is likely to hold King of hearts. Also, seems like he will not hold more than 3 hearts. So after winning the ♠A, lead the ♥J. If East covers, duck. East cannot continue spades to his advantage. Now you can win the return, draw trumps and enjoy the diamonds. If east fails to cover, we can draw trumps and run the diamonds.

Play problems are much more interesting than bidding problems to me... A bunch of people I used to play with, claimed very often without any evidence whatsoever that a certain bid is obvious, based on the result of the particular hand in question. This had become so annoying that I now play with them only very rarely. Maybe that is one reason I started liking play problems better, where there is a way to decide then and there what a reasonable line is, instead of running simulations to decide if a bid is correct... Actually no. That is not the reason. Play of the hand can present _extremely_ beautiful challenges, which (IMO) bidding does not.

Dummy reversal + squeeze in minors seems a nice approach.

Tidying up a little.. [hv=d=s&v=n&n=sk9xxhxxxdakxcakt&s=saqjxhadxxxxcq9xx]133|200|Scoring: IMP Dealer South. Bidding goes 1D - 3H - X - P - 4S - P - 4NT - P - 5S - P - 5NT - P - 6S - P - 7H - P - 7S - P P P Lead ♥K.[/hv]

These were the hands. [hv=d=n&v=e&n=skqjtxhqxd9xcajtx&s=s9xhaxdaqtxckq9xx]133|200|Scoring: MP[/hv]

You are South and hold: xx, Ax, AQTx, KQ9xx opponents are silent throughout (only E/W are vul) Partner opens with 1S. Bidding goes: 1S - 2C - 3C - 3D* - 3S** - ? What do you do now? * 3D shows stopper in diamonds ** 3S denies stopper in hearts. Assume strong field and first board (i.e you do not know the state of the match).

[hv=d=s&v=n&n=s974hkdqt9543cqj8&s=sak863h32da82ca42]133|200|Scoring: IMP Bidding goes: 1S - P - 2S - P - 3S - P - 4S - P - P - X - P - P - P[/hv] West who was an intermediate player, seemed to double a game contract whenever he had some high cards. Contract is 4S by South after bidding shown. West leads the ♦K (likely a singleton, from previous experience). Now what?

XP has a command line utility, findstr. open a command window. (start -> run. Type in cmd and press enter) cd "C:\bridge base online" findstr /S /I fred *.lin This should do a case insensitive search for 'fred' in all the .lin files in bridge base online directory and its sub directories. For the computer savvy: Findstr for XP