A hand from last nite...

[ralph23]

♣♦♥♠

 

[hv=d=s&v=b&n=sk865haj3d74ct976&e=sq9742hq74dq532c2]266|200|Scoring: IMP[/hv]

 

The bidding was nothing to be proud of, so don't pay too much attention to it, but a slam was reached. Assume NS are fairly good intermediate players. EW play standard defensive signals.

 

South deals and opens 1♣. EW are silent through the auction.

North responds 1♠.

South jumps to 3♣.

North now raises to 4♣.

 

South bids regular Blackwood, 4nt.

North shows one Ace, 5♦.

South bids 6♣, ending the auction.

 

Partner opens with the Jack of ♦, which South wins with the Ace.

 

At trick 2, South cashes the Ace of trump; all follow small.

 

At trick 3, South cashes the King of trump, and partner follows again with a small ♣.

 

What is your play at trick 3, and why?

 

Adv & Exp pls hide your answers.

[jtfanclub]

Queen of diamonds. Loses only when declarer has the AK98 of diamonds, Kxx of hearts, and a spade void. Odd choice of Blackwood if he has a spade void.

[ralph23]

Queen of diamonds.  Loses only when declarer has the AK98 of diamonds, Kxx of hearts, and a spade void.  Odd choice of Blackwood if he has a spade void.

 

He doesn't have a ♠ void, no. They're not the greatest bidders, but they're not THAT bad... :lol:

 

Why the Queen of ♦, again?

 

I'm not sure what your purpose is here, maybe I misunderstood when you said "loses only when...."

Edited August 15, 2007 by ralph23

[jtfanclub]

Why the Queen of ♦, again?

 

I'm not sure what your purpose is here, maybe I misunderstood when you said "loses only when...."

I need to cover both spades and hearts. I might want to keep a diamond as an escape card, but I need partner to cover diamonds. What better way to make sure he covers diamonds than to sluff the queen?

[Finch]

Why does partner need to keep diamonds guarded?

[Quantumcat]

Well declarer seems to have 11 tricks: 6 clubs, 2 hearts, 2 diamonds, a diamond ruff. If he has 4 diamonds he has 12 tricks because he can ruff 2 diamonds so ignore that. For his 12th trick he can try either the spade or the heart finesse. We know that the heart finesse loses but the spade finesse wins. We want him to take the heart finesse, so we discard a heart in a generally unconcerned manner as though we don't have the queen.

 

I guess he can't have 4 diamonds or he would have his 12 tricks, so the discard of queen of diamonds can't hurt you, but I really don't understand what it gains (maybe too deep for me).

[ralph23]

We want him to take the heart finesse, so we discard a heart in a generally unconcerned manner as though we don't have the queen.

That's certainly an idea. Your thinking process is great here. If you discard a ♥ in your regular tempo, declarer may reason "Well, that wouldn't happen if East held the Queen, so West must have it." {NB - It is of course unethical as you know to vary or try to manage your tempo or manner in a way that is intended to influence declarer.}

 

Of course, declarer may have already decided to take the ♠ finesse (provisionally anyway), and since he's going to do that anyway, he might decide to just bang down the AK of ♥, just in the slight chance that someone was dealt Qx in ♥... there's no harm in doing that if you're planning to take the ♠ finesse.

 

But your discard might talk him out of such a ♠-finesse-plan and make him take the losing option!!

 

Or we could look at it this way (the way my partner looked at it, at the table): Instead of thinking "I do want him to take the ♥ finesse", you could turn it upside down: "I don't want him to take the ♠ finesse."

 

So what can you do, perhaps, to make him think that taking the ♠ finesse is a bad idea?

Edited August 16, 2007 by ralph23

[Finch]

I think a bit of clarity on exactly what potential 'finesses' there are would be useful. The missing high cards are

 

AJ of spades

K of hearts

AK of diamonds

AKQ of clubs

 

That's 24 HCP. Declarer clearly doesn't have all of them (and indeed, if he did, he'd be looking to make 7). Declarer made a NON-FORCING 3C rebid.

 

We already know declarer has the DA and the AKQ of clubs.

 

Which of the remaining high cards do you think partner has? Why?

[ralph23]

Which of the remaining high cards do you think partner has? Why?

You may want to re-read the first line of the posting before you put too much faith in the bidding to guide you.

 

But let's look at declarer's distribution(s).

 

We know he has 6♣ to the AKQJ(xx).

 

We know he has at least one ♠ since he used Blackwood.

 

We know he doesn't have two small ♥ (or a ♥ void) since he used Blackwood.

 

If he started with 5♦ to the AK, he must have 1-1 in the majors, and he's going to make it, no matter what we do. He'll ruff out my ♦, his 5th one will be good, and he'll just lose the Ace of ♠.

 

If he started with 5♦ to the Ace empty, he must have 1-1 in the majors, and he's going to lose a ♠ and a ♦ all day, no matter what he does; unless he has the stiff ♠ Ace, in which case he's going to make his contract all day, by just giving up a ♦.

 

If he started with 4♦ to the AK, then if he has ♠xx and ♥x for his 3 major suit cards (we ruled out his having 2 losing ♥), he's going to make it. He has no choice of plays, except to hope the ♠ Ace is onside.

 

If he started with 4♦ to the Ace empty, he must have 2-1 in the majors, and he's going to lose a ♠ and a ♦ all day, no matter what he does; unless he has the ♠ Ace, in which case he's going to make his contract all day, by just giving up a ♦.

 

If he started with 3♦ to the Ace empty, then he has 4 major cards, and he has a diamond loser all day, and we'll cash our ♦ winner as soon as we get the lead. So he's going down unless he holds both the Ace of ♠ and the King of ♥ in this case.

 

If he started with 3♦ to the Ace King, i.e. ♦AKx, then he has 4 major cards... hmmmm....let's come back to this one later.....

 

If he started with AK♦ tight, we know he has the King of ♥ and at least one other ♥. He can't have 4♠ and a stiff ♥, since responder bid ♠. He has 5 major cards, and if he has the Ace of ♠, he has 4 major winners; he'll make it.

 

If he doesn't have it, he'll succeed if he has ♥KT(9)(x) and guesses the Queen correctly; but he has no other choice of plays.

 

If he started with Ax♦, he has a diamond loser that EW will take as soon as they get the lead; so he better have the ♠Ace and be a good Queen guesser, holding something like ♠Ax ♥KT9 or maybe ♠AJT ♥Kx. But he has no choice of plays here either.

 

If he started with ♦AKx, however, it gets more interesting.. he has no minor losers, being able to ruff his third diamond, and 4 major cards. If he has the Ace of ♠, he has 3 major tops and no problem... if he lacks both the Ace of ♠ and the ♥ King, he has no chance.

 

So it's really only interesting when he lacks the Ace of ♠ but has the King of ♥. Now he has 11 tops, 9 minors and ♥AK, and a choice of plays for his 12th trick.... a major suit finesse in any case.

 

My partner didn't go through all that to guess that I had the Ace of ♠. When declarer Blackwooded and didn't try for 7, he concluded that it was likely that I held an Ace, and after trick two, it was clear that I held the Ace of ♠.

 

So on the second round of trumps, he discarded the 9 of ♠... trying to sell declarer on the notion that he (East) held the Ace of ♠.

 

[hv=d=s&v=b&n=sk865haj3d74ct976&w=sajht9852djt98c43&e=sq9742hq74dq532c2&s=st3hk6dak6cakqj85]399|300|Scoring: IMP[/hv]

 

Declarer finessed me (West) for the missing Queen of ♥, lost the trick to East, and the Ace of ♠ was the setting trick.

[Quantumcat]

I guess discarding the high spade achieves the same goal as discarding the heart, but there is no risk involved. Cool.

 

What was all that about guarding suits and throwing the queen of diamonds? I didn't understand it.

[jtfanclub]

I guess discarding the high spade achieves the same goal as discarding the heart, but there is no risk involved. Cool.

 

What was all that about guarding suits and throwing the queen of diamonds? I didn't understand it.

Don't worry about it...I was wrong. I figured a possible squeeze coming up.