Prize problem

[dburn]

[hv=d=e&v=n&n=skq3hjdqj2ca86542&e=sa92hk1098765d73c7]266|200|Scoring: IMP[/hv]

 

You, East, open 3♥ and South's overcall of 3NT is passed out. West leads ♥3, jack king, two. You continue with a heart of your choice - ace, queen, club.

 

Declarer leads a diamond to the queen, cashes the jack of diamonds and leads a third round. Your partner has played the nine and four of diamonds in that order, to indicate a doubleton.

 

What do you discard on the third round of diamonds, and why?

[Free]

♥, so I give the impression that I don't hold an easy entry (read ♠A). We're NV vs V so my preempt may be very light.

[bluecalm]

The layout when it matters is Q♣ of clubs in partner hands and KJT in declarer's.

In such case he will hava to guess clubs.

If I discard a club now he may believe I am :

x

KT9xxx

xx

Qxxx

 

Because from this hand I couldn't afford to discard 2 hearts.

If I go ♣/♥/♠ to diamonds he may play me this hand (club length so finesse queen in my hand).

I can't spot any other chance.

[nigel_k]

Declarer has eight tricks so partner will need to have ♣K. If he has KJ or better there is no play so the key situation is K with partner and QJ with declarer. The only way declarer might not take the club finesse is if he places me with ♠A and ♣K and plays for a strip squeeze.

 

I am marked with seven hearts so if declarer decides I have three spades then I can have only one club and the strip squeeze won't work. So I need him to play me for 2722 which is conveniently the only shape where a three heart opening with this much in high cards would make any sense.

 

That means discarding one (encouraging) spade and then hearts, finally pitching a club on the last diamond. If declarer decides to play me for Ax K109xxxx xx Kx then he'll play a club to the ace on which I'll pitch my small spade and we take the last four.

[bluecalm]

Declarer has eight tricks

 

Damn, I somehow though declarer has 5♦.

My previous post doesn't make sense at then.

[gnasher]

Declarer has eight tricks so partner will need to have ♣K. If he has KJ or better there is no play so the key situation is K with partner and QJ with declarer. The only way declarer might not take the club finesse is if he places me with ♠A and ♣K and plays for a strip squeeze.

 

I am marked with seven hearts so if declarer decides I have three spades then I can have only one club and the strip squeeze won't work. So I need him to play me for 2722 which is conveniently the only shape where a three heart opening with this much in high cards would make any sense.

 

That means discarding one (encouraging) spade and then hearts, finally pitching a club on the last diamond. If declarer decides to play me for Ax K109xxxx xx Kx then he'll play a club to the ace on which I'll pitch my small spade and we take the last four.

I don't think declarer is at all likely to play you for that. Even the most conservative bidder would open that at the one-level. He might, however, play you for Ax K109xxxx xx Jx.

[benlessard]

The best i can do is returning the 9H trying to convince the declarer that the H suit might be blocked.

 

Putting drug in declarer coffe so that he doesnt take the club finesse is my 2nd best option.

[y66]

I like that H9 idea a lot. Everything else seems futile.

[shyams]

The best i can do is returning the 9H trying to convince the declarer that the H suit might be blocked.

When declarer plays the third diamond, partner unblocks the blocking heart. We are back to square 1

Putting drug in declarer coffe so that he doesnt take the club finesse is my 2nd best option.

This is probably a stronger line ;) :)

[Codo]

Why isn't the trivial solution the best?

He has eight tricks and he needs his nineth in spades or clubs. We are "sure" that partner has the king of clubs. IF he holds another club honour too, there is no story. So the critical layout is, where declarer misses just these two honours- the ace of spade and the king of clubs.

Declarer has to decide which one we hold.

So, if we play as if we possess the club king, and come down to

 

♠A ♥ 876, ♣7 he may play us for ♥876 ♣ K7.... and play a spade.

 

But maybe he thinks that IF we show him the club King, we may well hold the spade ace, so he may try a club if we insist to heavily in clubs.

 

But may he thinks, that we think.... Anyway, I woud come down to the 5 cards above.

[gwnn]

Show the club king if you and declarer's level add up to an even number

 

Show the spade ace if they add up to an odd number

 

wtp?

 

This works for levels that can be reasonably approximated as natural numbers. I don't know but I think there must be an analytical continuation to negative or complex numbers.

[billw55]

Basically agree with Codo. Declarer has two options, I should try to get him to try the wrong one, in whatever way I think will work.

[gnasher]

So, if we play as if we possess the club king, and come down to

 

♠A ♥ 876, ♣7 he may play us for ♥876 ♣ K7.... and play a spade.

But if we had that and he did that, partner would play ♠A and we'd throw away the small club.

[benlessard]

Why isn't the trivial solution the best?

He has eight tricks and he needs his nineth in spades or clubs. We are "sure" that partner has the king of clubs. IF he holds another club honour too, there is no story. So the critical layout is, where declarer misses just these two honours- the ace of spade and the king of clubs.

Declarer has to decide which one we hold.

So, if we play as if we possess the club king, and come down to

 

♠A ♥ 876, ♣7 he may play us for ♥876 ♣ K7.... and play a spade.

 

But maybe he thinks that IF we show him the club King, we may well hold the spade ace, so he may try a club if we insist to heavily in clubs.

 

But may he thinks, that we think.... Anyway, I woud come down to the 5 cards above.

Maybe because partner has a 3rd H. So that if partner has the A of S and i have the K of clubs hes doomed anyway there is no endplay.

 

When declarer plays the third diamond, partner unblocks the blocking heart. We are back to square 1

Maybe he will play a S at trick 3 while the H are still blocked.

[shyams]

When declarer plays the third diamond, partner unblocks the blocking heart. We are back to square 1

Maybe he will play a S at trick 3 while the H are still blocked.

But this presumes that what the OP describes as already happened (discard question at trick 5), will not happen if you play ♥9. I am not sure I'd make that assumption

[pooltuna]

Basically agree with Codo. Declarer has two options, I should try to get him to try the wrong one, in whatever way I think will work.

yep I come down to the same 5 cards but instead of playing mind games with declarer I discard in order ♥ retaining enough to set the hand and then ♠ the same way I would discard if I held 92 KT98765 72 K7

[benlessard]

But this presumes that what the OP describes as already happened (discard question at trick 5), will not happen if you play ♥9. I am not sure I'd make that assumption

 

1 - I wish i could play the 9 quickly without thinking hoping declarer is convinced that partner led 3 from QT3 (instead of the T or Q).

 

2 If declarer is convinced he will play S. No matter who has the A if the H suit block hes making 3NT.

 

3 your line of partner unblocking H is irrelevant. Because the ruse work or doesnt nothing more to it.

[nigel_k]

Who would actually return the nine if they started with K987xxx? This would give away the blockage and isn't believable.

[benlessard]

Who would actually return the nine if they started with K987xxx? This would give away the blockage and isn't believable.

Most "B" players that like to play quick and didnt saw that H might be blocked wich a is fairly frequent when they have a sure side enntry. Im not saying its likely to work but i dont see anything else as worthwhile.

[dburn]

Interesting answers, these, and I have no wish to comment on the theoretical or practical merits of any of them - merely to pose the second part of the problem, which is this:

 

The only discard from your hand to defeat the contract is the seven of clubs (no one so far has actually discarded this, so you all start again on an equal footing). Why will only this discard suffice?

[jdonn]

The suspense is killing me.

[mikeh]

The only argument that I can find is psychological and is susceptible to infinite spy v spy regression.

 

If we held Ax K1098xxx xx Kx, as a skilled defender we'd know at trick 4 that we were a sitting duck for a strip squeeze. A skilled defender, forced to stiff an honour, will do it as early as possible.

 

So a skilled declarer, attributing this level of skill to us, wouldn't be fooled by our pitching the club 7 from this holding....he'd expect it.

 

So when we play the club 7 early, declarer is caught in a weird sort of restricted choice scenario...... if we had the 2=7=2=2 hand with Kx clubs, we 'had' to make this pitch, while if we didn't, we might not think of it. Therefore the fact that we made the pitch suggests that we probably had no choice.

 

Even if he paid us the compliment of thinking that we would 'probably' think of this deception, the odds favour us making the play by force rather than deception by approximately the margin between our being good enough to stiff the K early otoh and, otoh, our being good enough to recognize that we had to be deceptive.

 

my head is spinning.....btw, I had come to the conclusion that the club 7 was the best pitch, for these reasons, before reading David's last post...if it is best for some other reason, that has entirely escaped me.

[jdonn]

I am far too much of a beginner at bridge to know the answer to this problem, but I'm not bad at logic. And I have the ol' sneaky feeling that if this was simply a case of spy vs. spy to make declarer think we were strip squeezed then we wouldn't be getting asked why only one particular discard will suffice.

[JanM]

I am far too much of a beginner at bridge to know the answer to this problem, but I'm not bad at logic. And I have the ol' sneaky feeling that if this was simply a case of spy vs. spy to make declarer think we were strip squeezed then we wouldn't be getting asked why only one particular discard will suffice.

Me too, although I (even with expert help :)) haven't been able to come up with a hand where it matters what I do.

[benlessard]

The only discard from your hand to defeat the contract is the seven of clubs (no one so far has actually discarded this, so you all start again on an equal footing). Why will only this discard suffice?

 

My drugs in the coffee play start to look pretty good now..