dellache

[hv=d=n&v=e&n=sxxhkjxxdkqxct9xx&s=saqjtxxhaxxdckqxx]133|200|Scoring: IMP _P_ _P 1♠ 2♦ _p* _P DBL 3♦ _3♥ _P 4♥ (*) DBL would have been "Drury-like"[/hv] Your stupid system doesn't allow you to DBL 2♦ w/ the North hand at his second turn. Now : 1. What was the worst bid : the DBL, 3♥, 4♥ ? 2. ATB.

[hv=d=s&v=n&n=sk9xhkjt8dj9xxcxx&s=sajxxhaq63daxcjxx]133|200|Scoring: IMP 1NT-2♣ 2♥-3♥ 4♥[/hv] Lead is ♦K East playing the 2 (odd number). When you play a Heart to dummy, West discards a Club. Take it from there.

I would reject the genuine chances to make this (stiff ♠J by West for example) and choose a more practical play. I need West to have the ♥Ace to have any chance of stealing this. West knows that I have the ♦J, and I want to benefit from this before East has any chance to signal. I take the ♦Ace, and play a Heart toward the Queen. West has to take this and cash out if he also has the ♠K. No doubt he may/should find the right defense, but if he doesn't he will be subjected to a triple suit squeeze. (I suppose I play a weak NT and opened a maximal weak NT hand).

The trump squeeze allows you to make even if East has ♠KJxxxx. Actually there's no case where the simple squeeze is better than the trump squeeze.

You mean : "... the stiff ♠K *AND* the ♣Ace" I guess... That's true and it's very rare because now West needs to also have the ♣Q.

AJT9xxxx Qxx --- xx. The contract is unmakeable unless you play against an imaginative East who plays small when you lead a small Heart from dummy at trick 2. (It doesn't prove that East should not duck the Heart anyway. The situation is not that clear, and the difficulty for East is to duck in tempo, when South specifically has Q9x).

I agree with Suokko's argument but not with the conclusion. There's yet another factor in favor of the Heart finesse : the case for the club finesse includes the cases where Clubs are always guessable : ♣AQx+ by West. OK but then those cases exclude hands like x Axxx KQ(J)x AQxx where West may have found a T/O double :). This gets even more clear when West has got a Spade void. All in all, in practice I would definitely finesse the ♥10.

I came up with a very slightly different conclusion about the final choices. The problem is clearly : East having 6=3=4=0 distribution. What do we do playing single dummy ? 1. I really don't think that West failure to cover an early SQ means anything : it's difficult to see why you would intend tu run it at this stage so it looks like a "if they don't cover they don't have it" play (discovery play looking at the given dummy). Most of the West I know would routinely play low without second thought, unless they have KJ. 2. The trump squeeze routinely covers all winning cases, you just reach the following position implied by Ben (South to play) : S Void H Void D 87 C 7 == S Q9 H Void D Q C Void If East is not 6340 you have already claimed, and at this stage, East has kept 2 Diamonds and one Spade. Now you can still decide on East having kept the King or Jack of Spades. The rationale for playing him to have the Jack is OK because as Nigel pointed out, more oppos would bid 2S with the Kxxxxx(6) than Jxxxxx(6). OK but then, what happens if your oppos won't open a weak 2 because : a. the play the Fantunes system ; OR b. their religion forbids them to open 2S in second with a void and a 3 card possible Heat fit (a religion that has many adepts (not me) in France). This considerations appear to change nothing unless... the Spade Jack appears from East at trick 10. Now, do we think that East played a deceptive Jack having Jx all the time ? Mmmm... Let's lead the SQ now. What will West think ? "Where is the Spade 9 ? Did West play the J because he had J9 (the T was in dummy)". Well, I guess West will cover the Queen now if he has K8. So if East had the SKJ we will also most likely make this. Well it means I don't exactly agree with bluecalm when he says that "the squeeze needs to place 2 specifics spade honors in order to make". Hope I didnot miss something which would make the above analysis a complete mess :)

Not at these colors. Too bad if CHO leads a Heart against 3NT by LHO.

I just need to play Clubs before Hearts. I take the ♦ in hand and duck a club. They take it and play a ♦ Back. Club finesse now. Say East takes this and clears the diamonds. Now I block the spades (Spade to King) and play a Heart to the Jack. Just hope that East is not 0355, and that the round Aces are as needed to win this.

He has ♣K, and knows that if he plays another diamond we'll take the rest of the tricks. A spade switch gives us the opportunity to do something stupid, such as the line I originally suggested. We could also say that West doesn't know where the C9 is and wants to prevent us from taking the Club finesse twice because he has Kxx. But I agree your answer also makes sense. BTW playing the ♦ Jack instead of the known Queen was real bad play. Anyway the good line always seems to cash SK, DQ and play 9C.

I think the diamond layout is clear to West regardless of the auction, as long as they play 4th best leads. If East had only two diamonds, he'd know that declarer had five of them, and wouldn't lead one back at trick two. Thus West knows that East has four. That's not true. With those clubs in dummy, EW may just need to cash out their 3 available diamond tricks (West=AJxx, East = Kx), before declarer can score his 11+ tricks. From East POV, even with Kx, a shift may just lead to a cold bottom at MP. IMP it's another story. BTW : what other reason can we find to explain West's shift ?

1♠ then rebid spades.

That LHO gets endplayed seems rather irrelevant to me, as the field will be taking 11 tricks whenever LHO has Kxx. (Or am I wrong in assuming that 3 rounds of diamonds will be the normal defense start?) As I said in my post the diamonds may well be ATxx to K9xx. In that case West has to guess if you had QJ9xx or the actual hand. The non diamond continuation at trick 3 advocates this. It's difficult to guess what will happen at the tables that bid 1C 1S 2C 2N 3N. The Dia continuation looks safer but is that clear?

If south bypassed his spades by bidding a direct 2N he has lots of inferences : diamonds are 44 and west was afraid that you had qj9xx. East has long spades otherwise west would have led one. West has at most 3 hearts because he didnot lead one (Axxx is a bad lead). So it is very likely that east has at most 1 club. Now the theorical line is to play HA cash Sk Dq and play the c9. The practical approach maybe to play a straight c9 after HA hoping that west will forget to cover it with Kxx. East will probably not be able to duck this (it would have been better to play dq instead of the Jack) and you cover yourself against stiff ck and slight misanalysis of defense motives and/or ability (CAN we trust their ability to lead correctly?)

In the system I play (it includes some components derived from ambra) we would bid like this: 1D 4+d unbal 1H relay 2H 4+h 11-14 2N relay shape 3S 0463 4C agrees D 4H 6 loosers 3 keycards Now South is known to have void Axxx Axxxxx Axx and we don't care about the possible Heart Jack. 6D

There is a standard for every event. If they think they can claim they lead "random", I would just like that the rules *force* them to play "standard". If that seems odd let me take just one example : Question : what do you lead from a doubleton 75 against suit contract ? Only 2 Possible answers : - always the 7 ; - always the 5 ; (let's forget the possibility that you lead "preferential for a return in another suit"...) Generally speaking, I think the rule of what you lead from "yx" doubleton should be *deterministic*, and available to the defense. Otherwise it's not too difficult to see that undetectable and efficient cheating methods can take place. What is true for doubletons should be true for any holding. You seem to be confusing random from undisclosed. In fact the answer to your question is neither the 7, nor the 5, but both. No Phil, you just don't see my point. I'm not sure it's wise to describe any cheating methods on a forum, so please see private message in your mailbox. Regards. It is not cheating to deviate from your agreements. And you are bound to disclose it opponents if it is common. I'm not talking about deviating from agreements, which is sometimes a good idea. I'm talking about the agreements themselves. A lot of posters explain that it is sometimes fine to deviate from 4th best, deceive declarer on count, etc. This is absolutely obvious and very well known : you DO have agreements, you sometimes deviate from them, there's usually a good reason why you decided to deceive declarer, your partner is also deceived (but it doesn't matter on the board). Afterwards, as an opponent, I can check that you really did deviate from your agreement (for example, if you play online bridge, I can look at what you lead in similar situations if I'm suspicious... actually I won't do that). If you really play "random" leads AS AN AGREEMENT, how can you deviate from this agreement? It seems difficult :ph34r:. How can your opponents check that you are really leading "random"? also difficult, and usually impossible. I'm not really at ease when opponents play an agreement that is IMPOSSIBLE to check aterwards even on 100000 deals. Cheaters could even use this "white noise" to send hidden signals, based on an undisclosed secret. As nobody even thought about this on this forum, I think I have my conclusion : I'm getting paranoid.

There is a standard for every event. If they think they can claim they lead "random", I would just like that the rules *force* them to play "standard". If that seems odd let me take just one example : Question : what do you lead from a doubleton 75 against suit contract ? Only 2 Possible answers : - always the 7 ; - always the 5 ; (let's forget the possibility that you lead "preferential for a return in another suit"...) Generally speaking, I think the rule of what you lead from "yx" doubleton should be *deterministic*, and available to the defense. Otherwise it's not too difficult to see that undetectable and efficient cheating methods can take place. What is true for doubletons should be true for any holding. You seem to be confusing random from undisclosed. In fact the answer to your question is neither the 7, nor the 5, but both. No Phil, you just don't see my point. I'm not sure it's wise to describe any cheating methods on a forum, so please see private message in your mailbox. Regards.

There is a standard for every event. If they think they can claim they lead "random", I would just like that the rules *force* them to play "standard". If that seems odd let me take just one example : Question : what do you lead from a doubleton 75 against suit contract ? Only 2 Possible answers : - always the 7 ; - always the 5 ; (let's forget the possibility that you lead "preferential for a return in another suit"...) Generally speaking, I think the rule of what you lead from "yx" doubleton should be *deterministic*, and available to the defense. Otherwise it's not too difficult to see that undetectable and efficient cheating methods can take place. What is true for doubletons should be true for any holding.

My concern was : can they use a (non)convention that is impossible to verify by observation? Imo it opens a definite easy possibility for undetectable (at least by direct observation) cheating methods.

You play in a team of 4 event against a strong field. At the beginning of the match you ask your opponents how they lead. ANSWER : "we lead random spot cards that show absolutely nothing". Is that really allowed ?

I've (re)learnt that in order to improve yourself you have to read ideas from many different (good) players. What I like on these forums : 1. very good posters with many different styles, from different countries ; 2. usually thoughtful postings with details, people take some time to express their views -- I especially like it when I realize I was wrong afterwards ; 3. variety of problems (carding, bidding, play, defense, ethics...) 4. enough people better than me. At first I went on these forums because I was stuck at home having H1N1. Finally I have decided to spend time here on a regular basis. And I need to practice my english... which I learnt by reading bridge books mostly. Second thing I've learnt is that fluffy was not an old 75y/o english lady playing ACOL.

Agree with Nigel and Fluffy. Moreover, in the end I would trust West ♥ count at trick 3, because usually, the weak hand signals count honestly in this position at the beginning of the play. Hence the necessity to watch the spots carefully.

What rubbish! Pass.

Exactly the same answers for me. On board 1, I'll bid 4NT only if I'm able to bid it fast. I don't want my RHO to know I've made a borderline bid. On board 2, DBL may very well help them if they intended to play in the 4-4 in 4♥. And I'm not so sure partner will like to declare any doubled contract if he has 3523 in a 0-4HCP hand.