quiddity Posted April 14, 2011 Report Share Posted April 14, 2011 Assume you're playing matchpoints, defending a normal-looking suit contract (let's say spades are trumps) and find yourself on lead in a cashout situation - declarer has established enough side-suit tricks to take the rest once he gets in. Dummy to your left has ♦Qxx and you can place partner with three or four diamonds to the ace. What do you lead from ♦KJx? What do you lead from ♦Kxx? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trumpace Posted April 14, 2011 Report Share Posted April 14, 2011 J from KJxK from Kxx. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
quiddity Posted April 14, 2011 Author Report Share Posted April 14, 2011 I saw this problem from the other side last night; I held ♦ATxx and partner led a low diamond through dummy. Insert the T or go up with the ace? Holding KJx, it seems to me that in case declarer holds T9x(x) you should start with ♦K and continue with a low diamond to give him a chance to go wrong. Holding Kxx, you can afford to start with a low diamond and partner will know that you don't hold the jack. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JLOGIC Posted April 14, 2011 Report Share Posted April 14, 2011 If you play king and then low from KJx and declarer plays low from dummy how does your partner figure out to put in the ten from AT now? It all depends on the situation, but usuallly you would lead the jack from KJx since your partner might have A98x as a technical play (this is the only play which gets you 3 tricks). Usually playing the king and then low from KJx will never fool declarer (because you wouldn't do this with AKx) and will only serve to fool your partner. In some situations if you think partner is going to get confused it's better to forego the surrounding play and just play king then jack with KJx though. Likewise with Kxx it is always right to just bang down the king then play one to prevent partner from messing up. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trumpace Posted April 14, 2011 Report Share Posted April 14, 2011 I saw this problem from the other side last night; I held ♦ATxx and partner led a low diamond through dummy. Insert the T or go up with the ace? Holding KJx, it seems to me that in case declarer holds T9x(x) you should start with ♦K and continue with a low diamond to give him a chance to go wrong. Interesting. If declarer knows that K and A are split (perhaps indicated by a non-diamond lead etc), by playing K from KJx and then playing low, you have given away a trick when declarer holds Txx(x) or a guess to declarer when he holds T8xx. What was the full hand? EDIT: I guess I should refresh before posting! +1 to Justin's post. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
quiddity Posted April 14, 2011 Author Report Share Posted April 14, 2011 If you play king and then low from KJx and declarer plays low from dummy how does your partner figure out to put in the ten from AT now? It all depends on the situation, but usuallly you would lead the jack from KJx since your partner might have A98x as a technical play (this is the only play which gets you 3 tricks). Oh right! I missed this technical play. If the guess were the only thing that mattered then you could always start K from KJx and low from Kxx and partner would know what to do. What if dummy held ♦Q9x or ♦Q8x, would that change things? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Finch Posted April 17, 2011 Report Share Posted April 17, 2011 If you ALWAYS play K from KJx and low from Kxx then you should disclose this to the opponents, and they won't have a guess any more anyway. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JLOGIC Posted April 17, 2011 Report Share Posted April 17, 2011 If I needed 2 tricks and knew my partner had the ace and also knew we needed 2 tricks, I would play the king first from any holding that contained the king. Then I would play the jack next if I had it (this is in the variation where dummy has Q9x or Q8x, I would still surrounding play if it was Qxx unless there was some reasonable defense partner could take if I led the jack first, then I would go king then jack to clarify it). If I needed 3 tricks then it is a huge mind***** that has cost me a lot of time of my life thinking about. If you don't get what I mean, consider what to do as declarer with: Qxx opp Txx the opps are forced to play the suit, and it's known to be 4-3, and they shift to low. Obviously you pop queen, because a good opp will shift to the jack if he has it right? Well what if you had Qxx opp T9x They don't know you have the 9. So if you will "always" pop queen when they don't play the jack, then they can play low from HJx and get you when you have T9x! Also, do you know the honors are split? If not, LHO might just have Jxx. Etc etc, there are so many variations on this when you get down to the 8, or if the suit might be 5-2 (so you can duck the jack in an effort to block the suit), blah blah. So with Qxx in dummy, it's not always clear you SHOULD play the jack if you're trying to get 3 tricks and know partner has the ace. But few people ever pop queen in that spot, so it's s reasonable strategy in real life to always play the jack if you have it with an honor, and always underlead the AK. Likewise, if you have J9x you should play the jack. because declarer might have T8x and misguess the second round. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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