han Posted October 8, 2008 Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 KJxAK10xxxxA10x Red against white, IMPs, partner deals and opens 1D. Righty overcalls 3S, you play no special gadgets, your move. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kfay Posted October 8, 2008 Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 I double-->4♥. Partner is probably not going to move with a lot of hands where slam is on but it seems to be the best I can do. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fluffy Posted October 8, 2008 Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 I bid 4 hearts, you cant have it all. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarkDean Posted October 8, 2008 Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 Tough one. At first I was bidding 4H, but I have convinced myself 3NT will make more often. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
P_Marlowe Posted October 8, 2008 Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 I double-->4♥. Partner is probably not going to move with a lot of hands where slam is on but it seems to be the best I can do. agree. With kind regardsMarlowe Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gnasher Posted October 8, 2008 Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 I'm not doubling. What would I do if partner bid 5♣ or 5♦? In any case, doubling and then bidding 4♥ suggests a choice of strains rather than a one-suited slam try. An immediate 4♥ seems preferable to 3NT. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gwnn Posted October 8, 2008 Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 I think 3NT will make more often in practice than 4♥, so I will bid that. Double dummy the two games are probably much more closer. Of course 3NT will miss more slams than 4♥ but that is not my first concern at the moment. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
han Posted October 8, 2008 Author Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 What's 4NT here? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kfay Posted October 8, 2008 Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 What's 4NT here? Quant. I would bid 3NT. Double then 4♥ is a joke, this shows a flexible hand with exactly 5 hearts. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdonn Posted October 8, 2008 Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 I double-->4♥. Partner is probably not going to move with a lot of hands where slam is on but it seems to be the best I can do.I would bid 3NT. Double then 4♥ is a joke, this shows a flexible hand with exactly 5 hearts.Credibility growing! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Finch Posted October 8, 2008 Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 What's 4NT here? Natural. But I don't think this is the hand for it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
han Posted October 8, 2008 Author Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 Why isn't this the hand for it? It seemed to me that 4NT was right on values and my hand looked notrumpy. Well, ok, my hand didn't look notrumpy but I thought notrump would likely play as well or better than hearts. The problem with 4NT is perhaps that partner will expect a balanced hand? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdonn Posted October 8, 2008 Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 Why isn't this the hand for it? It seemed to me that 4NT was right on values and my hand looked notrumpy. Well, ok, my hand didn't look notrumpy but I thought notrump would likely play as well or better than hearts. The problem with 4NT is perhaps that partner will expect a balanced hand? Seems light to me. I think around 18 balanced would be typical. Of course how you count for the long heart suit is up to you, but there is a bad fit for partner's diamonds as well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andy_h Posted October 8, 2008 Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 Singleton in partner's suit is a bad sign. Double might result in partner making an unfavourable bid. 4H seems just right. Preempts work, and now I have GF with 6 hearts by the AK so I will bid them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
han Posted October 8, 2008 Author Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 Well, suppose you take a rosier view of this hand and end up in 6NT, never having bid your heart suit. LHO leads a spade and dummy tables xxQ9AQxxxKQxx RHO wins the ace and plays back a spade. You finesse of course and lefty pitches a diamond. How do you continue? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mikeh Posted October 8, 2008 Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 edit: misread dummy.. will think, for a change, before posting Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mikeh Posted October 8, 2008 Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 Having belatedly realized that dummy has 4 clubs, there is a complex line that allows us to test clubs... playing for 4 winners on 3-3 or short Jack, which it turn allows us to hook the diamond, and play LHO for a red suit squeeze, thus avoiding the embarrassment of losing to the heart J in rho's hand. However, I don't see how we can try for this while falling back on a heart to the 9 if clubs don't behave..we have no entries outside of the club suit, and, unless the J appears early, only one hand entry in the suit....not to mention that this line also needs the diamond finesse... and rho surely didn't deny the diamond K. So I go back to where I came in: take an immediate heart finesse of the 9... lho has 12 non spade cards to rho's 6, so a priori, this finesse is 2 to 1 favoured to work, which is, I think, the best we are likely to do. While a 3-2 heart break is, absent other info, slightly better than 2-1 odds, that is not true after the preempt. Even adding back in the small chance of stiff J in rho, I think the straight-up play in hearts is less than 66.66% However, my analyses have recently become worse than their normal not-so-good level, so I look forward to learning what I missed this time :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gnasher Posted October 8, 2008 Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 I take a heart finesse. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
han Posted October 8, 2008 Author Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 I thought it interesting that playing clubs first increases your chances if you play hearts from the top. After all, if clubs split 3-3 then you can fall back on the squeeze if hearts turn out to split 4-1, so making it if hearts split, or if hearts are 4-1 and clubs 3-3 and the diamond king is onside (quite likely since diamonds would be 5-2). I agree with mikeh that just taking the heart finesse is probably still better. When this hand came up RHO didn't return a spade but his stiff heart, which made everything easy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
benlessard Posted October 8, 2008 Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 I agree with 4Nt. The chance of missing a slam by bidding 3Nt are much higher than the chance of reaching a bad slam + the chance that 4Nt go down. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cherdano Posted October 8, 2008 Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 I checked the odds using Pavlicek's suit break calculators.Hearts 3-2 is 53.9%, and singleton ♥J either way is 7.3%.Hearts 4-1 and clubs 3-3 is 11.3%, so 5/7 of that (diamond finesse on) is 8.1%. So altogether the squeeze line is 69%, which seems slightly better than the heart finesse.(I ignored Mike's comments about picking up ♣Jx as in this case either hearts are running or the squeeze can't work.) Of course the difference is negligible, but I guess we intuitively underestimate how much the singleton ♥J adds as a chance. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
655321 Posted October 8, 2008 Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 In my regular partnerships, 4NT is RKCB for diamonds. I agree that if 4NT is natural, it is a reasonable bid. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gnasher Posted October 9, 2008 Report Share Posted October 9, 2008 I checked the odds using Pavlicek's suit break calculators.Hearts 3-2 is 53.9%, and singleton ♥J either way is 7.3%.Hearts 4-1 and clubs 3-3 is 11.3%, so 5/7 of that (diamond finesse on) is 8.1%. So altogether the squeeze line is 69%, which seems slightly better than the heart finesse. I think you've double-counted the cases where ♥J is singleton, but the requirements for the squeeze also exist. You only get 4/5 of 8.1, so the overall probability of success is 60%. That's still better than the heart finesse, which seems to be 57.4%. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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