the charms of playing bridge

[catatonic]

sometimes you just have to wonder why you play this game !

 

playing here with a partner of whose methods I know nothing except that we have agreed sayc, I get the following hand

 

♠AKJT

♥Q984

♦QJ94

♣4

 

so open a diamond ; no intervention , pt bids 2 clubs ; now , some people seem to think that a reverse here is strong and GF and some don't , so I decide to temporise with 2 diamonds which at least promises no more than a minimum opener

 

partner decides to raise diamonds .....he bids 6! ; deciding this probably means that he has a diamond suit with me I pass , and he puts down

 

♠Q87

♥AT

♦AK

♣AK9863

 

club lead , draw diamonds 4-3 , heart to A and find RHO with KJx !! so the contract rolls in ; for some reason opps seem to think this is somewhat lucky , can't think why !!

 

couple of boards later I pick up the following at red v green

 

♥A874

♦KQT95

♣QT86

 

pt deals and opens a weak 2 hearts, pass , and to no ones surprise I bid 4 hearts ; 4 spades bids the next hand promptly , passed around to me

 

now red v green sacrifices are rare situations in my experience , but here it seemed correct to me

 

5 hearts and 4 spades might both make

5 hearts may be 1 off with 4 spades making

they might bid 5 spades making or not

it's just as difficult for the opps to judge at the 5 level

 

so I bid 5 hearts followed by pass, pass, x

 

and pt [ same as before as were the opps ] turns out to hold for his red v green weak 2

 

♠652

♥QT9652

 

♣7543

 

and not surprisingly , gets a spade lead ..low ruff on table , advances K diamonds from table , not covered , throws club , loses to A ; OK so far ?

his LHO decides it is time to cash some clubs , so advances the K from KJxx , neatly collecting his pt's bare A !

having started with Jx of trumps and Jxx of diamonds , another of his solid spades to make the dummy ruff again looks best to RHO , so he does that ; pt ruffs , lays down A hearts , dropping the bare K from his LHO

 

at this point , not dissatisfied with events ,I adjourn for a natural break ;on return I discover that pt has racked up a score of -800

 

and in case you are wondering , no, I didn't ask !

 

sometimes virtue must be it's own reward

 

anyway , as I said , honours even

[655321]

club lead , draw diamonds 4-3 , heart to A and find RHO with KJx !! so the contract rolls in ; for some reason opps seem to think this is somewhat lucky , can't think why  !!

Probably they did not like your line of play.

 

On your line, if you misguess the hearts you go down. Therefore it seems normal to play on hearts before drawing trumps, so if you misguess you can ruff a heart, and still make the contract when the ♦10 is with the 3 card holding.

 

sometimes virtue must be it's own reward

[catatonic]

actually that was the line I dismissed first ; balance of probabilities is that the 10 diamonds is[ 4 to 3 times] more likely to be with the longer holding [ ignoring other breaks ]

I considered finessing the 10 hearts , but considered the extra chance of a misplay or any doubleton honour on my right a better chance

 

any mathematicians about ?

[ArtK78]

In 6NT, a heart to the 10 appears right to me. You have 12 tricks anytime the ♥J is to the right of the AT, or anytime the ♥K is doubleton.

 

Playing for a squeeze by ducking a club early or running all of your tricks after a heart to the 10 loses doesn't seem to be right for lack of entries. Of course, if you play a heart to the 10 and it loses, and the opponents do not return a club, you have a free shot at a heart-club squeeze.

 

In 6♦, you could rely solely on the line above or you could combine the chances of the ♥K onside (meaning to the left of the ♥Q) with the chances of being able to ruff the third round of hearts and being able to pull trump. It seems to me that the chances of the ♦10 falling in the third round is better than the chances of the ♥K falling in the second round, assuming that the relevant heart card is offside on the line of play that you choose. Given that diamonds must be 4-3 for you to have a chance to succeed in 6♦, the odds that the ♦10 is tripleton is 42.86% (3 out of 7). If you play a heart to the 10 and lose to the J, you need the ♥K to fall doubleton in a 5-2 heart break. That is considerably less than 42%.