A hand I misplayed

[gnasher]

[hv=pc=n&s=skj7542hkj82d8ckq&n=sa8h954dk2cat9742&d=w&v=b&b=4&a=1c(Clubs%20or%20any%2011-14%20balanced)pp2sp4sppp]266|200[/hv]

West leads ♣6, playing 4th best leads. East plays ♣3.

 

Edit (18th November): 1♣ includes any weak notrump that doesn't have a five-card major. That is, it includes all 3352/3253/2353 shapes. They might also open 1♣ with a 2452 shape, to avoid a rebid problem.

Their leads are 4th, and second from xxx.

Their carding is standard count and upside-down attitude.

Edited November 18, 2010 by gnasher

[nigel_k]

Cash second club, ♠K and A, run clubs discarding hearts.

 

I could also pitch a diamond but then if West ruffs and plays ♦A I have to discard a heart instead of ruffing.

[mikeh]

Cash second club, ♠K and A, run clubs discarding hearts.

 

I could also pitch a diamond but then if West ruffs and plays ♦A I have to discard a heart instead of ruffing.

 

what if West ruffs, cashs the diamond and exits a low heart (or the 10 from AQ10x)?

 

My line: unblock the club, lead a diamond.

 

Aseume LHO wins...what can he return? Say a diamond.... we win, throwing a heart and cash the top club....throwing another heart. West can't refuse to ruff, since we then play the top spades and yet another club, throwing a 3rd heart....we lose a spade, a diamond and one heart.

 

If he ruffs the club A...what does he return? He has no reply....if he leads a low heart at that stage, we win and pull trump ending in dummy.

 

If he ducks the diamond, we again play a top club..again, he can't ruff, so now we again cash two trump and then another club...we lose 2 hearts and one spade.

 

Note that these lines requires that he be 3=4=4=2...if he is 4=4=3=2, I don't think we can ever make.

[nigel_k]

Maybe you're right.

 

I was working on the assumption that West has J86 in clubs. Then he can play a third club when in with the ♦A. I can overruff and play two top trumps but then if I cash the ♦K West can ruff the next club and exit with a diamond, and if I don't cash it, he can ruff and exit with a low heart.

 

We need to know more about their opening style and carding.

[gnasher]

We need to know more about their opening style and carding.

Sorry. 1♣ includes any weak notrump that doesn't have a five-card major. That is, it includes all 3352 shapes, and I expect that some 2452 shapes would be included too, because 1♦-1♠;1NT would not show a weak notrump.

 

Their carding is standard count and upside-down attitude, so you can assume that the clubs are xx-Jxx.

[Fluffy]

I think mike is right, if we can reach dmmy with ♦K we can force LHO to ruff the club and now spades will likelly be 2-2 with dummy high. ♣KQ followed by diamonds looks best to me.

[gnasher]

Their carding is standard count and upside-down attitude, so you can assume that the clubs are xx-Jxx.

On reflection, you can't assume that. This was in England, where people play MUD from three small. Hence the clubs could also be 965-J3. All this misinformation is getting a bit confusing, so I'll edit the original post.

[mikeh]

On reflection, you can't assume that. This was in England, where people play MUD from three small. Hence the clubs could also be 965-J3. All this misinformation is getting a bit confusing, so I'll edit the original post.

I had assumed that the alert of 1♣ merely announced it could be on 2, and the (assumed to be standard because not alerted) carding suggested 2=3: not that LHO might have 5 diamonds or that LHO might lead MUD! I do think that posting play problems without disclosing the information that real-life declarers would have is wrong.

 

Now that I have more info, however, I certainly start the same way: unblock the clubs...now I will know what they hold in that suit.

 

If LHO started with 2, I will proceed as above. If rho has 2, then I draw 2 rounds of trump ending in dummy, as per nigel, and cash (I hope) 2 clubs (west ruffing the 2nd) pitching 2 hearts....LHO is endplayed..

[gnasher]

I had assumed that the alert of 1♣ merely announced it could be on 2, and the (assumed to be standard because not alerted) carding suggested 2=3: not that LHO might have 5 diamonds or that LHO might lead MUD! I do think that posting play problems without disclosing the information that real-life declarers would have is wrong.

I provided an explanation of 1♣ as well as an alert. If you click on the highlighted 1♣ bid, you will see the text "clubs or any 11-14 balanced" . That explanation was present in my original post.

 

If you assumed standard carding, that was fine. The opponents would give standard count with Jxx, and would, I expect, play the low one from Jx.

 

As for the MUD leads, you're quite right, but I have the excuse that I've only just realised that this was a possibility. They had xx-Jxx, so you can ignore the MUD possibility if you like.

 

Anyway, I think that there's a line which is correct both with the information I gave you originally, and with the information you now have. And it's not the one you've suggested.

[mikeh]

I provided an explanation of 1♣ as well as an alert. If you click on the highlighted 1♣ bid, you will see the text "clubs or any 11-14 balanced" . That explanation was present in my original post.

 

If you assumed standard carding, that was fine. The opponents would give standard count with Jxx, and would, I expect, play the low one from Jx.

 

As for the MUD leads, you're quite right, but I have the excuse that I've only just realised that this was a possibility. They had xx-Jxx, so you can ignore the MUD possibility if you like.

 

Anyway, I think that there's a line which is correct both with the information I gave you originally, and with the information you now have. And it's not the one you've suggested.

 

My apologies....somehow I missed that...I thought I had clicked on the 1♣ and saw nothing....I see that I must have screwed up...it works when I'm a little more careful...mea culpa.

 

I await the correct line with interest...I admit I don't yet see a line that works more frequently than the one I suggested

[gnasher]

I think I owe Mike an apology.

 

This is what I thought was the right line: ♣KQ, ♠KA, ♣A throwing a diamond. If LHO ruffs that and exits with DA, we ruff and lead ♥K to endplay him. If at any point he tries to exit with a low heart, we play dummy's 9.

 

I thought this worked all of the time that LHO is 3=2 in the blacks (which is when Mike's line works), some of the time that he's 2=2 or 2=3, and a bit of the time that he's 4=2.

 

However, my line goes down when LHO has ♠Qxx and ♥AQ10x - when I try to exit with ♥K, he can duck. So, if we're confident that LHO has 3+ spades and 2 clubs, we should play Mike's line (even though mine is prettier).