dburn

Why not? Heart to the ace, heart to the king, spade to the ace, heart queen, diamond to the jack. Ace of diamonds, king of diamonds pitching a spade, diamond pitching another spade while a defender ruffs. You still have the ace of clubs as an entry to the last diamond, on which dummy's last club is discarded.

I am not generally given to metaphysical speculation, but I confess that if this hand had come up at my table I would be wondering vaguely if God had dealt me those spade intermediates so that I would make the slam, or so that I would go down in it. Minor points: If you are going to follow the "spades early unless hearts 4-1" line, the first spade you play from your hand should be the ten. West cannot know that he ought not to cover this; for aught he can tell, your only chance may be to bring in ♠10xx facing ♠AJ8 for one loser. If he does not cover, he might have found the only defence to let through a hopeless contract. When he does not cover, then, you may perhaps revise your estimate of the chance that he has a spade honour. Someone on another thread was asking how to win matches: if there are swings to be generated in the play at all, they are often generated by playing the card that will put your opponent under maximum pressure, even though it makes no difference in percentage terms which card you play. Suppose that the hearts were solid but that you had no spade intermediates whatever. Having escaped a club lead, so that you have a re-entry to your hand, should you play for the necessary four diamond tricks by trying to ruff down the queen, or by finessing the jack? Would your answer vary if West showed up with: three trumps? four trumps? five trumps? People who suck at math need not attempt this question, although it would perhaps be better for them if they did.

Not quite sure why I should block the trumps, as seems to have been suggested above.* Obviously it would be convenient to discover whether hearts are 4-1 before following some committal line, but the original post says merely that the opening lead was a trump. If I have the impression from the trumps played to my left and right that the hearts are 3-2, I will win the first trick with ♥K and lead a spade to the jack. *Edit: by "above" I did not mean mikeh's post, which I did not see while I was writing mine, but an earlier post that I had skimmed. No doubt it is technically correct to play as mikeh suggests, just in case hearts really are 4-1. But [a] if they are, you will need to cross to the ace of spades to play for the diamond miracle, and that could result in a lot of extra undertricks; I hate telling the opponents anything early in the play, such as by giving away the trump distribution at trick two. I plan to win a minor-suit shift, play a spade to the eight and draw trumps. Unless by now I have lost two spade tricks, I should have plenty of chances for the contract. Edit: of course, another advantage of playing two trumps ending in hand before the first spade finesse is that East might have two hearts and a singleton spade honour. And pigs might fly, and banks might be a good place to keep your money. It should be noted that since West did not lead a high spade, the chance that East in fact has both spade honours has increased from an original 25% to... well, to what? If you believe that West would always lead a high spade from KQ, then the chance that East has both spade honours goes up to 33%, and the odds probably then favour the simple line of drawing trumps and playing a diamond to the jack (making with 3-3 diamonds or 4-2 diamonds with the queen onside, around a 64% chance). But if you believe that West would sometimes lead a passive spade without an honour than a passive heart, the chances that he has an honour increase again by a factor that is difficult to calculate. At the table, of course, I would have seen the trump spots (or honours) played by the opponents to trick one. Such information is often helpful when presenting play problems; perhaps one of the reasons that people are more willing to tackle bidding problems than play problems is that at least in the former, one has all the information one needs before one starts.

The question of how you play to trick one is not actually a technical matter but a psychological one. Of course you will win the trick in the South hand to preserve high trumps in both hands, but with which card? Because you are not playing RKCB at your partner's behest, he does not know whether you actually have ♣Q, and may be concerned lest you have an unavoidable trump loser. If you wish to reassure the poor fellow, you should win the opening lead with the queen, not the ace. If on the other hand you wish to punish him for making you play these methods, you should win with the ace, not the queen, to prolong his suffering.

Would bid 3♦. But with three spades, I would pass.

[hv=d=s&v=b&n=sakj53h4dkj4ck752&s=s10haq1053da2caq984]133|200|Scoring: IMP[/hv] You, South, and your partner - The Great Malinowski - have arrived in seven clubs after the following antediluvian auction: 1♥-1♠-2♣-2♦-3♣-4♣-4♦-4NT-5♠-7♣. Five spades showed three aces, and seven clubs was in the pious hope that I could avoid losing a trick to the queen of clubs, preferably by having it myself. Whether or not I could avoid losing some other trick is not the kind of thing that tends to concern TGM all that much. West leads ♣3 on which East plays the ten. How should you play [a] to trick one and subsequently?

Oh, his suit may not have been solid originally. But he might now consider it solidified by the cue bid in clubs from his partner.

In simple terms, it seemed to me that East would hold two spades a little over 34% of the time (the a priori chance is a little less than 34%, but this increases slightly once diamonds are known not to be 5-0 or 4-1). East would by the same token hold three spades a little over 34% of the time, in which case I would need her to hold ♦Q. Given the diamonds played by the defenders, she would hold this card one third of the time. East would hold four spades and three diamonds around 3.5% of the time (a priori the chances of this holding are around 11%, but this must be adjusted because of the restricted choice implications in diamonds) and West would hold four spades and three diamonds around 7.5% of the time; in either of the last two cases I would need the club finesse. The total chance of success by playing on spades thus seemed to be 34% (East has two spades) + 11.3% (East has three spades and three diamonds) + 5.5% (spades 4-1 but the second high spade is not ruffed and the club finesse works). Having performed these cerebrations, I played on spades. Both defenders followed to two rounds, but when East produced the 13th spade I feared the worst. When West did not produce ♦Q, however, I could claim my contract. Of course, West had ♣Qxx, so absolutely anything I did within reason would have worked. Like other contributors, though, I had wondered whether the defenders could meaningfully affect the issue on a different layout by selecting their plays in diamonds. Certainly, if East had played the queen on the second diamond I would have had nothing to guide me as to the position of the jack, and playing on spades would have been clearly the better chance. Perhaps, then, West with ♦J10x, a doubleton spade and ♣Q should always play the ten, not the jack, under the king - a case where one ought not to select randomly from equals as a defender.

West in your diagram has the king, ten and three. How then was he able to play the nine? Assuming that the actual position is: [hv=n=sa842&w=s&e=s&s=sk103]399|300|[/hv] and assuming that South plays to the ten, losing to West's honour, then cashes the king, he should next finesse the eight whether East plays the nine or the other honour under the king. If East has played the nine on the first round and a low card on the second, declarer should still finesse the eight on the third round. The defenders cannot do anything to circumvent this strategy by declarer, which will win three tricks a little over 60% of the time.

If you believe partner has a minor-suit void, you should probably lead a club. Over the years I have been involved in several deals on which it was right to lead your second-longest side suit following a Lightner double, but it was not until recently that the reason for this dawned on me: your second-longest side suit was more likely to be the opponent's solid suit.

[hv=d=s&v=n&n=sak6432h64d2ckj65&s=sj7ha3dak97654ca7]133|200|Scoring: IMP[/hv] You, South, open 1♦. You could have opened 2♦, natural and strong, but you decided against so doing. At this point I am well aware that 99.99% of the readership will not understand what I have wrtitten so far, but I cannot help that. Your partner responds 1♠ and you bid 3NT, which in the modern style shows good diamonds and outside guards (but denies the ability to open a strong 2♦). Your partner bids 4♣ (do you agree? would Ken Rexford agree?), you bid 4♦, partner bids 4♠. You can pass this, but you think that maybe that ace of hearts is worth a show with ♠Jx, so you bid 5♥ and pass partner's 6♦. Who knows how well you have bid this? But at least when the dummy goes down, it seems that partner has done well to remove 3NT. The opening lead is the queen of hearts. You win the ace, and cash ♦AK on which LHO follows with the three and ten, RHO with the eight and jack. How do you continue?

Interesting, that. What am I supposed to do with: ♠Qxxxx ♥xx ♦Jxx ♣Kxx ? I mean, I would bid 1♠ at my first turn, would I not? But over 2♥, it seems to me that playing with Frances I cannot bid 2♠ because my spades are nowhere near good enough, I cannot bid 3♦ because that is forcing, I cannot bid 2NT because I do not have a heart stopper... maybe I should pass, or perhaps I should double for takeout. How far is 2♥ forcing, anyway? Maybe opener can't pass 2♠, although for the life of me I can't see why she shouldn't. But surely 3♦ can be passed, or the world has gone mad.

It is not easy for me to imagine a passed hand that would respond 3NT to an opening bid of three of a major. But such a hand would certainly have a fit for my major, and of course I could then pull. Facing a non-passed partner I would side with what I expect to be the majority view. Whatever your style of opening pre-empts, partner's 3NT response is final. If you are contemplating pulling it, you should have contemplated opening something else (and then done so).

Judge: Are you trying to show contempt for this court? Smith: No, my Lord. I am trying to conceal it.

I am abashed to confess that I have made no study of Smolen at all. What does 1NT-2♦-2♥-2♠ mean if playing Smolen? Does this meaning change if responder to 1NT is a passed hand?

How does he know this? The original post stated only that 2♣ was strong and 2♦ was forcing to game. Perhaps, as is played in many Scandinavian countries, the sequence 2♣-2♠ can be passed. I don't know whether the original poster was playing such a method, nor what other responses to 2♣ would have shown in his system, since he did not trouble to tell anyone. If I were going to bid over 3NT (and whether or not I would bid over 3NT depends on the system, which I do not know) then it is at least clear, if not CLEAR, to bid 4♦. If partner's diamonds are not headed by the ace, but the rest of the hand is solid facing my impressive holding in hearts, then it is imperative that I show the support I have. Even if partner's diamonds are such as AQ10xxxx, it is critical that I show genuine support and not an insistence on playing in notrump (for which my black-suit holdings are far too weak in any case). I have read the interchange between krexford and mikeh with interest bordering at times on incredulity. When I was young, I believed that if two people violently disagreed with one another about what should be done, then one of them must be wrong and the other right. Now, however, I am beginning to have doubts about the principle of the excluded middle. For well it was said by the bard: For many system-shoppers, it's a good-for-nothing system that classifies as opposites stupidity and wisdom, because by logic-choppers it's accepted with avidity: stupidity's true opposite's the opposite stupidity.

I have been frying what are left of my brains for the last hour or so on this combination. On such occasions, it's a relief to learn that Suitplay doesn't know how to play it either. The reason it doesn't is that in many likely positions, the defenders should chuck the ten and the nine around like confetti in order to disguise possession of the six. The state of the art is that we know how to play AK73 facing J82 for three tricks, but we do not know how to play AK74 facing J82 for three tricks. Given the state of the art, you are well advised to follow Fred's dictum that a man who plays the ten is unlikely to hold the nine. Whether or not he holds the six is left as an exercise for the reader...

No one plays penalty doubles any more, and despite what you may have heard, it is actually quite a bit harder for the opponents to catch you by playing penalty passes, and takeout doubles from opener, than by playing penalty doubles by third hand. Indeed, the worse your contract is, the harder it is for them to catch you, for if you happen to have alighted in a 5-0 fit, your overcall will travel round to opener, who will not balance with three cards in your suit because he's only supposed to balance on a minimum with shortness in your suit - isn't he? Even when he has a maximum, he might (for one reason or another) choose to re-open with 1NT or some other bid, rather than double. Now, this does not mean that you should give up negative doubles in favour of penalty doubles of one-level overcalls. What it does mean, as I remarked, is that you are at greater liberty to make Meckstroth-Versace-Cherdano-Jdonn one-level overcalls, because you will go for a huge penalty far less frequently than you "should". A word to the wise, though: if you are going to make these overcalls, you should think twice (or at least one and a half times) about them when your suit is headed by the ace. If they do catch you for 1100 or so in 1♠, you'd rather that your team-mates might bid and make a slam at the other table, and you don't need me to tell you that their chances of doing that are much greater when you don't have the ace of your suit than when you do.

An observation: as the emphasis in competitive bidding has changed from trying to punish impertinent opponents to trying to bid to your own best contract, so the opponents have gained a licence to be impertinent. Whereas this comes with many of the disadvantages Fred mentioned in his earlier excellent post, experience suggests that in the present climate, it may well be long-term winning bridge. Certainly Meckstroth and (particularly) Versace among the world's truly great players would stand by a style that makes a 1♠ overcall on ♠A109xx ♥QJxx ♦x ♣xxx clear, or even CLEAR, at any vulnerability. But Meckstroth has been playing with Rodwell for a while now, as has Versace with Lauria, and their partnerships have in place [a] methods to deal with the impact on their own constructive bidding of an overcall that has a range of about 4-18 hcp; the awareness that if partner overcalls 1♠ and the opponents bid confidently to 3NT, a heart lead from king-fifth might work better than a spade lead from two small; [c] the temperament and the experience to shrug and say "well, that was a bad result, but look at all the good ones these overcalls have gotten us over the years". You can be absolutely certain that Meckstroth is not kidding himself or anyone else when he stands by his 1♥ overcall; if he found that it was a loser in the long term, he'd have stopped doing it years ago. But that does not make it a winner in the long term - or even clear, let alone CLEAR - for you to do it playing with an unfamiliar or even a regular partner, who will lead your suit when that's wrong, or raise your suit with a doubleton when that's wrong, or generally fail to act with discretion when the auction gets tough. Style is not a personal thing; style is a partnership thing.

Not sure. Do you play negative free bids? For example, with: ♠KJ10xxx ♥Jxx ♦x ♣Qxx would you bid 2♠ after 1♦ (2♣)? Or would you double, planning to bid spades at your next turn? Or would you pass, hoping to bid spades at your next turn if you were given a next turn? Not that I see much wrong with the approach you advocate, although I confess I have never heard of it and would be surprised if it were regarded as "standard". But I am not sure how it would work.

I would have bid 3♦ at my first turn, and justified my call both in a system where this shows a limit raise and in a system where this shows a pre-emptive raise (useful to have such a hand, since it saves me the effort of remembering the methods). But I do not object to 2♦, nor to 3♠ - the auction has proceeded kindly for me, since I have by now given a good picture of my hand. Having done so, I have no reason at all to remove partner's double, particularly since I seem to have some useful defensive values in clubs.

It seems to me that whether or not you decide to balance with this hand is a function of what partner needs for a one-level vulnerable overcall. If I knew that partner would not overcall 1♠ with his actual hand, then of course I would balance over 1♦. If I knew that partner would often overcall 1M with a seven count, then perhaps I would not balance over 1♦ (although I would fear a double part-score swing if partner had a few values with 4-4 in the majors, for which reason I might actually balance with 1♠). For the record, although I would overcall with partner's actual hand, very many very strong players would not. Of course, they are all in the category described as "old has-beens" by a frequent contributor to these forums, so their views may safely be disregarded in present company.

Not really. 2♦ in standard methods shows diamonds and is a one-round force. North has something of an awkward call over it, but my preference would be for 2♠, to be followed by 3♦ over responder's presumed 2NT. Since opener has limited his hand already by rebidding 2♣, this sequence might sensibly be considered an exception to the blanket rule that fourth suit is forcing to game, if you have such a rule. I don't actually mind playing these in a part-score non-vulnerable - both 3NT and 5♦ are playable contracts, but both might easily go down. My sequence would be: 1♣-1♥-2♣-2♦-2♠-2NT-3♦-3♠-3NT.

If partner would understand 4♦ as natural, or even if he would treat it as choice of major-suit games, I would bid that. Since he is a passed hand, it is possible that he will not think I am making a slam try. But if there is some chance that he will not understand what I am doing, I will bid 4♠ and hope for the best. It strikes me that facing a passed hand, it makes some sort of sense to jump to 3♦ over Stayman with this kind of hand (especially with 2-2 in the majors).

I confess, I would have defended exactly as West did, on the basis of what East did during the bidding and the play. But this post was entitled "You Be the Judge", so it might not have had anything to do with the bidding or the play at all. My view is that lethal injection is far too good for East, and so is electrocution. Something lingering with boiling oil in it would be my verdict.