BPO 9 - Hand 5

[Phil]

On the other hand, how exactly are we going to make 2♠? Say a heart lead and a trump switch. Whenever you duck a diamond, they will play a club.

 

Why would I duck a diamond - don't I have 8 tricks?

 

In general -

 

- heart lead, trump shift won

- ♣A, ♣ruff

- ♦A, ♦K, ♣ ruff

- ♥ruff....and trump K.

[mtvesuvius]

Even if you duck a diamond, as long as you score one club ruff, LHO will eventually have to give you another trump trick. Without the club ruff I don't think it can be done, but I could be wrong.

 

In any case, I think this is a win for a 1♠ overcall :)

[kayin801]

If I passed I would get to a diamond contract which should make a bunch of tricks in practice (10 often! both hands have natural heart leads and unattractive trump leads after 1H-P-1S-P-,1NT-P-P-X-,P-2D-etc, though in my partnership N has an easy 1NT after 1H-P-1S which does the same thing). Shouldn't we take that into consideration?

 

EDIT: I guess the odds of us competing to 4♦ aren't hot, though I have no idea what they're going to compete in at the 3 level.

[mtvesuvius]

To make 4 in 2♦ requires double-dummy play IMO. You cannot cash the ♠K early, and you need to ruff all the hearts in dummy, reading the hand perfectly to exit with a spade in the endgame.

The hand played out:

2D

[rduran1216]

I think all these problems are style related. Not only can I pass now and dbl after 1H p 1NT p 2C...but maybe it goes 1H 1NT 2D 2H x by partner and we pick up 300