Final session of Mixed Pairs

[Hanoi5]

I ended up fourth in the mixed pairs tourney and although I made quite a few mistakes I think the worst of all sessions had to be the third.

 

First, please assign the blame for this terrible defense:

 

[hv=d=s&v=e&n=sq72hq64dkqj83c53&w=sk943hktd2cakt982&e=sajt6h87d9754cj76&s=s85haj9532dat6cq4]399|300|Scoring: MP

Bidding:

1♥ 2♣ 3♣ Pa

4♥ All Pass

 

Playing upside-down signals and leading the King from AK to show a singleton but the otherwise the Ace, West leads

the ♣King on which East plays the 7. ♣A on which East plays the

♣J and ♣T. Declarer ruffs and tosses a spade, letting the ♥Q to West's ♥K who then continues with another club...[/hv]

 

How would you play 6♥ on the ♥9 lead:

 

♠AKQxx

♥J64

♦Kxx

♣xx

 

♠Void

♥AKT82

♦Qxx

♣AQJTx

 

All white you hold:

♠QJ7x

♥Kxx

♦986

♣AJx

 

What's your bid if:

1♥ Pa Pa X (I bet you didn't like 1NT)

Pa 2♥ 3♣ Pa

Pa X Pa ???

 

I hope this one gets some answers for they are sort of interesting.

[Phil]

1. Too much blame to pass around. Seriously. I'm sorry but I'm not even going to attempt this one.

 

2. Does LHO have a pulse (or a wire here?)? Strange lead against this slam, but it sounds like to me that LHO has a lot of goodies, but I will play RHO for Qx of hearts or LHO to have the ♦A and LHO to have not led a stiff heart. If the heart doesn't drop, LHO needs to pop A♦. If they take their A♦, I'll try for a squeeze or finesse in the blacks.

 

Covering the heart seems right only when LHO led a stiff, or I get ♥97 tumbling down. 9xx seems better.

 

3. I balance with 1N, not x. No idea what to do here but I suppose I pass.

[jdonn]

1. East made the wrong signal, he must complete giving correct count. The queen of clubs falling is not conclusive, south may have been falsecarding with no useful pitch from dummy to fool west into not playing a third club. Llike holding AJ AJ9xxxx T Qxx he wouldn't want to be overruffed if the king of hearts is onside the whole time, and maybe west will switch and let him into dummy.

 

West then made the wrong switch, I don't really see anything in trumps that can be promoted so long as south ruffs with the queen of hearts. He might have to play a spade in case south has AT(x) and misguesses, like AT AJ9xxx Ax Qxx or something.

 

West's fourth round of clubs was probably the worst play, notwithstanding that on other layouts it may have already been too late due to earlier plays. What exactly was he trying to promote, did he play declarer to run the heart queen from dummy holding A9xxxx?

 

So east made the play that would usually be most costly with his wrong signal, but west made two mistakes including the most obviously wrong play. Allocate blame however you want, I don't care to touch it.

 

2. I wouldn't cover the heart, but too hard to answer without knowing the opponents, not to mention the auction. Like some opponents will never duck the queen of diamonds if I choose to lead that next, for example.

 

3. Pass, what else am I supposed to do? If partner didn't want me to pass on a (relatively?) normal double with AJx of clubs I think he would cuebid again, not double.

[kayin801]

1) What order should partner be playing from with J7 doubleton? If J, then 7, then partner has 3 cards and is trying to direct your switch. If 7, then J, then partner deserves violence.

 

Say declarer has xx, AKJxxx, Axx, Qx (a more reasonable hand for the bidding? Not a fan of South's 4H after the club overcall), then we need a spade switch right away, and that's what partner wanted you to do. (not that any switch but a spade really makes sense) Not sure what your agreements are though.

 

The return of the 4th club looking for the trump J in partner's hand? Not bad... except with A9xxx(x) declarer, when in, leading the heart Q seems to lose more often than it gains.

 

But I primarily blame East for putting West on tilt.

 

2) Agree with Phil, LHO thought any other lead was bad. I don't have anything to add here. Do you remember the auction, might that have influenced the lead so that a trump made a lot of sense?

 

3) Pass, if we get 300 it's gonna be great, if we get 100 it could be worse. If you expect partner to bid spades with a 4 card suit on this auction, especially pass, looks a lot more like X is points and no good bid at that point then.

[jdonn]

But I primarily blame East for putting West on tilt.

I like your style.

[Jlall]

Who leads the 9 fom 97x of hearts? 97 doubleton is clearly better imo. At the very least most people lead high from a doubleton and low from 3 in trumps even if they don't know why. This also happens to usually be the right thing to do when you are leading from one of those holdings.

 

It should also be of note that we are weighing 97x vs 97, and 9xx is irrelevant since playing either the jack or low will work (the 7 is going to fall the 2nd round if RHO has Q7 doubleton).

 

Also of note is that from 97x they have 3 choices of leads, from 97 they have 2. This obviously does not make up for the fact that there are twice as many combos of 97x, but it does help.

 

For instance if I think they will lead the 7 30 % of the time, the x 50 %, and the 9 20 % from 97x, and I think they will lead the 9 60 % of the time from 97, then it is about 1.5x as likely they have 97 doubleton than 97x. This is very significant, and I think those numbers are off in the sense that they are leading the 9 from 97x less than that, and the 9 from 97 doubleton more than that.

 

Also, if LHO has Jxxxx 9 AJxx Kxx the only way to make on the heart 9 lead is to cover, pull 4 rounds of trumps, and lead a diamond. LHO wins perforce and exits. we win the DQ, cash our trump and play a diamond squeezing lefty. If RHO does not cover trick one then we just cash 3 spades pitching 3 diamonds, hook the heart, and claim.

 

Sure a stiff trump is not that likely, but if LHO hated his options enough to lead one that is the type of hand he would do it with. So we have some added equity with that.

[andy_h]

Would have doubled 3♣ with East on the 1st hand, then we may get to our 4♠. In any case East should have completed the count with the 6. If one of the 'solutions' for J7 is to play the J first then how does East show when he has JTx?

[billw55]

heheh, if EW are going to defend that badly, then I suppose S can justify his outrageous overbid 4♥. Were EW looking tipsy, or already on tilt? Or does S always bid like that?

[ArtK78]

heheh, if EW are going to defend that badly, then I suppose S can justify his outrageous overbid 4♥.  Were EW looking tipsy, or already on tilt?  Or does S always bid like that?

I don't see how 4♥ is an "outrageous overbid." North already forced to game, presumably with some heart tolerance, so 4♥ is perfectly reasonble to me.

 

If you are going to criticize the NS bidding, then criticize the 3♣ call. 2♦ by North is perfectly reasonable - values, good suit - really, why would North make any call other than 2♦ (assuming that the partnership does not play this as game forcing)? He could then follow up with an invitational heart raise.

[billw55]

heheh, if EW are going to defend that badly, then I suppose S can justify his outrageous overbid 4♥.  Were EW looking tipsy, or already on tilt?  Or does S always bid like that?

I don't see how 4♥ is an "outrageous overbid." North already forced to game, presumably with some heart tolerance, so 4♥ is perfectly reasonble to me.

 

If you are going to criticize the NS bidding, then criticize the 3♣ call. 2♦ by North is perfectly reasonable - values, good suit - really, why would North make any call other than 2♦ (assuming that the partnership does not play this as game forcing)? He could then follow up with an invitational heart raise.

Ah, I was thinking of 3♣ as limit raise (or better), not GF. If it is GF, then you are obviously correct.

[andy_h]

3♣ as GF? Is that even playable? And why would you bid 2♦ with north's hand? What if the auction comes back to you at 4♣?

[ArtK78]

3♣ as GF? Is that even playable? And why would you bid 2♦ with north's hand? What if the auction comes back to you at 4♣?

I am so used to using 2NT in this sequence as an artificial game invitation in hearts that it never even occurred to me that others would see 3♣ as limit raise or better.

 

But yes, a cue bid as game forcing is playable. It used to be the only meaning for the cue bid (I am probably older than you).

 

And as to why one would bid 2♦ on the North hand - maybe because you have diamonds and values. You intend to bid hearts next. The opponents don't always bid to the four level and, if they do, I will bid 4♥. It might be right, it might be wrong, but that is what I am going to do.

[jdonn]

2♦ is not meritless, but 3♣ is not gf.

 

I mean even if you don't know 3♣ gf is not standard, we are still allowed to use our heads. If 3♣ was gf then north wouldn't have bid it on that hand!

[billw55]

If 3♣ was gf then north wouldn't have bid it on that hand!

Perhaps. But then again, if 3♣ is not game forcing then south would not bid 4♥ on his hand ... but he did. One overbidder deserves another ;)