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What a coincidence... A bridge column in the newspaper quoted this week:

" Many years ago, we asked a great world champion about leading against a slam.

...( He said) ' Don't even think -- if you have a ( sidesuit ) singleton or an Ace, lead it ' " .

 

Of course for the hand in that column, it happened to be the losing lead..... as Declarer had Q x x opposite K x x x.

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A low heart seems to be hoping for quite a lot: partner to have the king, declarer to have at least two, dummy's clubs not to provide the necessary discards. A low spade needs less, but still quite a lot: partner to have the queen, declarer to have at least two, declarer or dummy to have the jack.

 

A requires only that partner have a trump trick. Looking at a singleton trump, that doesn't seem that unlikely. I'd lead A.

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Since LHO didn't go via rkc without the A it seems reasonable to assume the s are solid along with first round control in and . It also seems probable LHO will have at least 2nd round control in s, which is probably the K. If you trust your opponents to have at least second round control in then I think the A is out as you are probably just setting up a trick (K or more) and handing them tempo to explore all their options.

 

A lead might make them misguess a suit they would have gotten right if you lead it, but leading a trump against this kind of contract also has a lot of inferences attached to it for declarer!

 

A small could work if you find your partner with the Q and opps with K and J. I wouldn't be prepared to take that risk because you might hand them an impossible contract if they have something like KQxx-x/Kxxx-Q/Kxx-Qx. It loses tempo and may allow them to set up a discard for their 2nd loser before you knock out the ace in that suit (eg. K or K with partner). is your shortest outside suit so if there is a suit they need to set up, it is most likely to be this one. If they have a guess to set up s, they may still have it later! Most people will automatically put up the J with KJT later in the play so they might still get it wrong.

 

Any of the other leads could work too but would be more likely to lead a than a . Simply because I have more of them and the opponents are more likely to be forced to start on that suit because they have more expected combined length.

 

So I suppose in the end I would lead a small .

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Knowing nothing about the bidder, I am stumped at what dummy's holding is to go straight to 6 without any interest of controls? The only type of hand that makes sense to me is something where you need to cash out the A and a slim hope for a trump trick, because your two Q's don't look to be lying favourably.

 

I just do not see how leading a low will get you anything that you would have not of had a good chance of getting anyway? The only issue would be the trick disappearing. The only other viable option is partner having a K in or , in which case leading the A could cost. It would not surprise me that the lead of a small could work.

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A requires only that partner have a trump trick. Looking at a singleton trump, that doesn't seem that unlikely. I'd lead A.

Additional (albeit probably unlikely) chance would be giving partner a spade ruff as dummy might track with long solid spades.

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A low heart seems to be hoping for quite a lot: partner to have the king, declarer to have at least two, dummy's clubs not to provide the necessary discards. A low spade needs less, but still quite a lot: partner to have the queen, declarer to have at least two, declarer or dummy to have the jack.

 

A requires only that partner have a trump trick. Looking at a singleton trump, that doesn't seem that unlikely. I'd lead A.

agree

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low spade puts them to a guess, RHO is a relatively new player so it would be hard to predict what she'd do. If we don't lead a spade, there is only 1 way to play spades so we concede the contract.

 

Dummy was

Kxx

Axx

AJx

AKxx

 

declarer

 

Jx

KJx

KQTxxxx

J

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if Karapet were to find the brilliant low spade lead, his partner, the secretary bird, upon a low from dummy would play the T from QT "just to check who has the jack" and a very surprised rabbit would take the trick and then proceed to (involuntarily) squeeze Karapet in the majors

 

LOL

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