How to play this hand

[twcho]

You hold ♠K9xx ♥xxx ♦AKx ♣AKT, a nice 17 HCP collection and hear your pd, white vs white, opens 1♦ in first position. Your RHO bids 3♥. OK, it is easy, you X. Your pd jumps to 4♠. So you have double fit and pd likely would have ♥A too. 6♠ should be of no problem and 7♠ is not impossible. You use the simplest tool, 4NT, KCB. Pd bid 5♠. You try 5NT asking for lowest K and as expected pd bid 6♠ denying any side K.

 

Now you trance into the possibility of grand. Your partnership will open 12-14 NT at this vul. So if pd is balanced hand, he may well bid 3nt in his 2nd turn (your double did not guarantee 4 card in ♠, though likely). Your conclusion is that pd should be unbalanced with 5+♦ and 4♠, if he has ♦Qxxxx, which he rates to have, you'll have 2♣, 5♦, 1♥ and 5♠. Now you think deeper into the possibility of 7NT. If pd has 6 card in ♦, maybe 7NT is safer. You trick out the master bid of 7♥ and after long thought, pd finally settles for 7♠.

 

Your RHO leads ♥K and turn to the position of your pd and help him to solve his problem. His hand being ♠AQJx ♥A ♦xxxx ♣Q9xx. How shd you play this hand?

[Trumpace]

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]

[Trumpace]

Dummy reversal + squeeze in minors seems a nice approach.

[rbforster]

I'm not sure it's the best, but here's my line -

 

Win A♥. Cash AQ♠ in hand. Cash AK♣. Assuming the J♣ hasn't appeared, let the T♣ ride. Ruff ♥ low to hand, cash the Q♣ pitching the losing diamond. ♦ to board, ruff a ♥ high. Now a ♦ to hand to draw the last trump and claim. Things are easier if the J♣ drops from the preempter since you can then proceed directly to ruff your ♥s, draw trump, and still overtake the T♣ to hand for the last 2 ♣ tricks.

 

This needs the non-preempting hand to be 3-2-?-4+ shape, with the J♣ in the long ♣ hand, or dropping singleton or doubleton in the preempting hand. If so, you can make by scoring 6♠ (w/ 2 ♥ ruffs), 1♥, 2♦, and 4♣ for 13 tricks. Entries are a little tricky, and you don't want to give RHO a chance to pitch a ♣ from exactly 4 on the 3rd round of hearts prematurely.

[temp3600]

I would play it this way :

 

HA, SA, SQ, CA, heart ruffed small, DA, heart ruffed with the SJ, CK, SK and S9 (discarding diamonds). Then CQ.

 

This line works when there are no (over)ruffs, and when either the CJ falls in three rounds or East is squeezed in the minors.

[kenrexford]

Because the 9 of spades seems meaningless, and yet pronounced, I expect this line:

 

You start along the lines of a dummy reversal and minor squeeze. Win the heart Ace, back with a diamond, ruff a heart, back with a club, and ruff another heart. Cash two spades, finding out that spades are 4-1, length in front of K9. So, back with a diamond (whew!), cash the second top club, watching the jack drop to the side not long in spades. Great news!!! Win the two clubs in dummy (the club 9 is also mentioned, and accordingly important), ditching your last diamond from hand. Now, pick up the trump suit en passant.

 

The layout:

 

[hv=n=sk9xxhxxxdakxcak10&w=s10xxxhkqjdqjcxxxx&e=sxhxxxxxxdxxxxcjx&s=saqjxhadxxxxcq9xx]399|300|[/hv]

 

Good guess??? LOL

[Codo]

Hi Ken in you layout, rho bid 3 ♥ on KQJ, quite unlikely.

 

I would play like the first poster, ruff my Hearts play trumps and squeeze in the minors. This needs basically trumps 3-2. Of course there could be better lines, but I won`t find them at the table.

[twcho]

Good job by Rob F. Minor squeeze won't work as the D is 33 and you would not have entry to enjoy the 4th C in hand although the C finesse is marked (C break 51).

 

But just as Rob stated, I'm not sure whether this is the best line. Can someone calculate the odds for this vs the minor suit squeeze play?

[Fluffy]

Start with ♠AQ if 3-2 just ruff 2♥ and try for the minors to work. If not you will need some kind of miracle. For example 4 rounds of ♣s not ruffed and cross ruff :P

[kenrexford]

Still laughing...

 

I suppose 3H on KQJ tight is a tad rich.

[rbforster]

Good job by Rob F. Minor squeeze won't work as the D is 33 and you would not have entry to enjoy the 4th C in hand although the C finesse is marked (C break 51).

Well I guess I'm glad I got the winning line at the table, but I actually think the minor squeeze line is better on average. I ran some numbers assuming any 7♥ suit in the preempting hand. If there's a bad ♠ break (1-4 or 4-1), the contract is usually going down regardless, although there are a few times when preempter has stiff T♠ that both lines can recover, ruffing 2♥s and hoping for 3-3♣s or the J♣ dropping doubleton.

 

In the remaining cases, the likely ones are shown below:

 

LHO        RHO      prob     rel.    my line    squeeze    notes

2-7-2-2  3-2-4-4  0.78%  35%  100.0%  100.0%   JC onside or dropping

2-7-1-3  3-2-5-3  0.42%  19%  50.0%    100.0%    mine needs JC showing up on 3rd round

2-7-3-1  3-2-3-5  0.42%  19%  100.0%   16.7%    squeeze needs JC dropping

3-7-2-1  2-2-4-5  0.31%  14%  16.7%     50.0%      mine needs JC dropping from LHO, squeeze must guess right which minor to play twice

3-7-1-2  2-2-5-4  0.31%  14%  0.0%       50.0%     my line gets ruffed by preempter, squeeze must guess right which minor to play twice

 

"Rel" refers to the relative probability of a given shape among those listed above. The last numbers refer to the fraction of times my line or the squeeze line work for a given distribution, usually depending on the chance of something good happening in clubs.

 

Adding up the numbers, my lines only works about 65% of the time in the above cases, whereas the squeeze works in about 70% of these cases. Both lines are the same on the remaining less likely distributions (those with a void in preempting hand). As you can see, picking up 3-3 ♦s on my line is not sufficient compensation for giving up on 3-3 ♣s and risking a ruff by preempter when they have the last spade. Still the risk of getting ruffed when preempter has 3 trump along the squeeze line makes this risky too.

 

Edit: fixed some more numbers.

Edited March 30, 2006 by Rob F

[civill]

I don't think it's a problem of play.

[twcho]

Thanks Rob again for the detail analysis. However I would like to add some comment on your analysis. For the last two possibilities, declarer may have problem of choosing which minor to get back to dummy to draw the trump after ruffing 2 ♥ in hand. He may well guess only 50% of the cases. So the resulting percentage will be even closer.

 

I doubt who can probably work out which is the best line at the table.

[rbforster]

I had thought about the issues of ruffs when preempter is 1-2 in the minors, but forgot to include it in my numbers above (it's updated now). If you assume declarer plays a second round of a random minor, the squeeze line will only make in 50% of the 37(12) cases. This makes the two lines very close, 65% vs 70%.

 

My hat's off to the defender holding xxx KQJxxxx x Jx and falsecards the J♣ on the first round of clubs thereby getting his ruff when declarer tries a second round of diamonds rather than clubs (in light of the jack appearing) when returning to his hand to draw trump.