Halo

I think I am allowed to comment.

If we want the club finesse, we can take it before the second diamond finesse.

Excellent bridge, well done.

4S Partner expects me to bid 4S when possible. Needs to be at the four level because that's where he was when he doubled.

Heart. If dummy is weak, no free entries in clubs.

4S Six card suit, bid 4S. Some aspects of the game are not difficult IMO.

Pass is sound, but I'll bid - 4NT. I don't want to be declarer, so I'll risk partner's choice (that's why pass is so sensible!)

My expectation is opponents are making usually ten tricks in clubs and we can easily go worse than -130. This is a clear pass for me: sure you can show me hands and contracts in any non-club suit that are winners, but it is still a clear pass.

I'd pass. Wouldn't occur to me to bid on. Partner does not compete on the assumption that I have zero. So I think I have about the hand (or less) that partner is relying on.

I really like this solution because ruffing the fourth club high is so hard to see. However, your are at risk of being overruffed on the third round of clubs and then losing when you might have made, and later you risk a trump promotion after playing AQ of hearts when the diamonds are 52/25. In addition if hearts are 14 there are situations you could recover from when taking the finesses that you no longer can. Attractive as it is I suspect it may be a little worse than just finessing - but it seems close at first look.

Pass Interesting post: I wouldn't have considered anything other pass, but I see there are arguments for other actions, and people who wouldn't consider pass at all.

6C Seems a practical option.

All a bit difficult. I would play from North and finesse the nine. One reason is that while it might seem that by playing the queen from South, I can pick up KJ8x or J8xx in West, in practice I dont think I will.

3H, what a great hand.

I'd rather be playing methods where I can bid 2C to show this hand.

3D. I have to bid this hand because I don't often pick up better ones.

Very nice guard squeeze, but somewhere the valuable Queen of diamonds went missing, I think. If it was led by West, it shouldn't have been. EDIT: Now I think about West in the diagram above could have kept two clubs and now the blockage in diamonds leaves declarer nothing.

I have found: 1. At MPs, whatever my impression of the session, there was almost always 5-10% or more available if I had played well - particularly defended better. 2. At IMPs, whatever I thought of a match, there were always opportunities to make life more difficult for opponents and to react more boldly to partner's attempts to find the best result. If you can consistently concentrate, but stay mentally relaxed and objective, you will rapidly be a better player than nearly anyone.

Why is not a squeeze?

As previously posted I agree with the above. I am not sure math is the issue on this hand. In a practical situation I would ignore 40/04. 31/13 balance out. 22 King offside doesn't matter. So Bridge wise (I believe) it comes down to 22 King onside versus stiff king onside and offside. So I still say the the finesse is the correct matchpoint play by a significant margin.

I would cross and finesse spades on the basis that if I cash the Ace I lose out to doubleton King on my right. That's a big loss and it doesn't feel there are nearly enough compensating distributions when I cash the Ace.

I'd never have found anything other than bidding diamonds. But the idea of bidding NT is interesting: need to think about it. Then etc, but passing is interesting.

In the UK negative doubles of various kinds are so near universal with 4-card majors that penalty doubles are alertable.

Always 2C for me.

4H I agree with pclayton, opps are on their way to slam, not wondering about game. In real life I would probably bid 5H.