6NT: What is your plan?

[maximusg]

[hv=pc=n&s=sq8hqt2dkjt64cq64&w=&n=sakhak94daq92ca73&e=&d=s&v=n&b=15&a=pp2c3sppdp4sp4np6nppp]399|300[/hv]

 

East leads the ♠5

What is your plan?

 

I managed to muck this one up and go down 1 sitting N, but I don't see where I went wrong.

[johnu]

You will get better answers if you don't give the defenders' hands. Almost nobody will give an incorrect line of play after seeing all 4 hands.

[maximusg]

You will get better answers if you don't give the defenders' hands. Almost nobody will give an incorrect line of play after seeing all 4 hands.

 

I realized this just before you posted and edited my post. Thanks.

[manudude03]

I win and play a club to the queen. If the king is onside, I'm now cold. So assume West wins the king and returns a spade. Now I just cash my winners outside of hearts before I decide whether to play for the drop or take a finesse against West for the jack. Just make sure you unblock the ♥T in case you do end up finessing.

[Phil]

I win and play a club to the queen. If the king is onside, I'm now cold. So assume West wins the king and returns a spade. Now I just cash my winners outside of hearts before I decide whether to play for the drop or take a finesse against West for the jack. Just make sure you unblock the ♥T in case you do end up finessing.

 

In addition, you have a lock on a squeeze when LHO is 4-5 in the roundeds.

[Cyberyeti]

I win and play a club to the queen. If the king is onside, I'm now cold. So assume West wins the king and returns a spade. Now I just cash my winners outside of hearts before I decide whether to play for the drop or take a finesse against West for the jack. Just make sure you unblock the ♥T in case you do end up finessing.

 

This has to be right, you will have a lot of info after 2-3 diamonds, 2 spades, 2 clubs

[MrAce]

I would cash 2 rounds of ♦ and 1 round of ♥ from N, see how many diamonds E has and assuming that he has stiff ♦ I play a ♣ towards Q but would not play the Q if E plays small. In case E has 3 club ♣ where his biggest spot is higher than 7.

[wanoff]

Tricky if when you play a club towards the Q, East ducks with the K.

You obviously also duck and will expect the show-up squeeze to be 100%.

Not this time but there are other chances like J doubleton heart or the hearts are 5-1.

[rmnka447]

I win and play a club to the queen. If the king is onside, I'm now cold. So assume West wins the king and returns a spade. Now I just cash my winners outside of hearts before I decide whether to play for the drop or take a finesse against West for the jack. Just make sure you unblock the ♥T in case you do end up finessing.

One more for this line.

[MrAce]

One more for this line.

 

Why is it so hard for people who agrees with Manu's line to understand that playing low club to the Q wins only when E has Kxx (x)+ he ducks

 

vs the line that play towards to Q but plays low if E plays low, which wins when E has

 

8xx

9xx

Txx

Jxx

 

 

 

If E has 4 clubs, things change of course, but that is why I cashed 2 rounds of ♦ and 1 round of ♥ before I played clubs. In this auction if E follows 3 rounds of red suits, his chances to hold 4 card ♣ is slim to none. If E has 2 or less clubs, what we play does not matter.

 

But even if we calculate all the odds of winning when E has 3 or more clubs, ignoring the unlikeliness of E holding 4-5-6 card clubs, still playing to Q has about %32 and playing towards Q and ducking has about %36 success rate.

 

ALSO add to that, when E has no ♣ K he will ALWAYS play low. When he has the K he may or he may not. That alone is a huge factor because it increases my overall success rate. E playing low has no effect on the line that plays small to the Q. Because it wins only when E has the K and played small and we already calculated them all. Basically, when W has the K, there is no opponent behavior that can possibly increase the already calculated success rate of playing to the Q.

[Cyberyeti]

Why is it so hard for people who agrees with Manu's line to understand that playing low club to the Q wins only when E has Kxx (x)+ he ducks

 

 

Why is it so hard for you to see that most of the time your line doesn't gain anything at all. You would have to believe your opp is finding this 3♠ overcall off J10xxxx, Jxx, x, 8xx (which many people won't) for it to gain, level of competition may matter here.

 

I think overcaller below top level will have 7 spades more often than 6 with a poor suit, and if he has any 3 clubs and a diamond can only have 2 hearts so the finesse will work.

[MrAce]

Why is it so hard for you to see that most of the time your line doesn't gain anything at all. You would have to believe your opp is finding this 3♠ overcall off J10xxxx, Jxx, x, 8xx (which many people won't) for it to gain, level of competition may matter here.

 

I think overcaller below top level will have 7 spades more often than 6 with a poor suit, and if he has any 3 clubs and a diamond can only have 2 hearts so the finesse will work.

 

LOL, I will not bother to explain again. Think again and you will find why what you said is nonsense.

 

Hint for you, i NEVER said that when E has the K and if he ducks, I will be able to read the position later and make the contract. Which is not true but I gave them all to the benefit of other line and totally excluded my line from reading anything. I put all those hands into "losing" part of my line in the calculations.http://www.bridgebase.com/forums/public/style_emoticons/default/wink.gif

 

But again, as usual, you just want to turn a card play calculation to bidding debate by using words like "I think he should have this or he should not have that forthis bidding" bs. I am not going to debate what people bid 3♠ with white vs red when they open strong 2♣.

[Cyberyeti]

LOL, I will not bother to explain again. Think again and you will find why what you said is nonsense.

 

Hint for you, i NEVER said that when E has the K and if he ducks, I will be able to read the position later and make the contract. Which is not true but I gave them all to the benefit of other line and totally excluded my line from reading anything. I put all those hands into "losing" part of my line in the calculations.http://www.bridgebase.com/forums/public/style_emoticons/default/wink.gif

 

But again, as usual, you just want to turn a card play calculation to bidding debate by using words like "I think he should have this or he should not have that forthis bidding" bs. I am not going to debate what people bid 3♠ with white vs red when they open strong 2♣.

 

I'm just looking at practicalities, and with 2♠ available, 3♠ won't even occur to most people with 6 to the J.

 

If you're suggesting that you should ignore the bidding in analysing the play ...

[MrAce]

I'm just looking at practicalities, and with 2♠ available, 3♠ won't even occur to most people with 6 to the J.

 

If you're suggesting that you should ignore the bidding in analysing the play ...

 

I am not saying to ignore the bidding.

All I am saying is math is more reliable source than your or my ideas/expectations about what 3♠ should be white vs red after 2♣ opening. http://www.bridgebase.com/forums/public/style_emoticons/default/smile.gif

[smerriman]

I'm just looking at practicalities, and with 2♠ available, 3♠ won't even occur to most people with 6 to the J.

Am I missing something - if that's the case, then it makes no difference whether you play the queen or not. So surely the case of having 6 spades is the only one that should be used to decide between the two options.

[johnu]

Am I missing something - if that's the case, then it makes no difference whether you play the queen or not. So surely the case of having 6 spades is the only one that should be used to decide between the two options.

 

Why is that? In the end position, you will have

 

♥ A9

 

_______________________

 

♥2

♣x or Q

 

_______________________

 

You will know the diamond split, and have played 2 round of clubs and hearts. When you lead the ♥2, and the jack hasn't showed up yet, you need to guess/know if East's last card is ♥J, or a winning club.

 

East could have started with 7=1=2=3, 7=1=3=2, etc. 7 card suits where it makes a difference how you played clubs, in addition to all the possible 6 card suit distributions.

[MrAce]

Why is that? In the end position, you will have

 

♥ A9

 

_______________________

 

♥2

♣x or Q

 

_______________________

 

You will know the diamond split, and have played 2 round of clubs and hearts. When you lead the ♥2, and the jack hasn't showed up yet, you need to guess/know if East's last card is ♥J, or a winning club.

 

East could have started with 7=1=2=3, 7=1=3=2, etc. 7 card suits where it makes a difference how you played clubs, in addition to all the possible 6 card suit distributions.

 

You are missing the 7213 and 7312 and 7303 and 7204 and 7402 shapes. (Though I am giving them the benefit of doubt that they can read it when E has 74 hands)

These guys played the club suit without touching diamonds and committed to a line before having any clue in diamond suit.http://www.bridgebase.com/forums/public/style_emoticons/default/wink.gif

When E has short diamonds, they will NEVER know in last 4 cards whether E held Jxx♥+ a ♠ or xx♥+a♠+a♣

This gets uglier when E has 6 card spades. But as I showed, their line is inferior even when I give East ALWAYS a 7 card ♠ with ♦ shortness.

 

You will get better answers if you don't give the defenders' hands. Almost nobody will give an incorrect line of play after seeing all 4 hands.

 

I think OP accidentally gave all the 4 hands at the beginning and they saw diamonds split which biased their line. I did not see the hand and I still don;t know the original hand. This is why I specifically mentioned that I test the ♦ suit and one round of hearts before I play clubs. I would have no problem with their line, had they cashed 2 rounds of diamonds and saw E with 2 or 3 diamonds. But once E shows out on 2nd diamond or first diamond, things change a lot IMHO.

[smerriman]

Why is that?

What I meant (I think) is that by playing the Q you're hoping East has Kxx - but if that's the case, and you're assuming East has 7 spades (and made sure no diamond void), then the finesse was guaranteed to work anyway, so it made no difference. You might as well have just played low and taken the finesse to begin with.

 

So playing the queen will *never* gain under the 7 card assumption.

[Winstonm]

I will win and lead a low club, intending to duck a club, rectifying the count, then win any return, cash the club Ace (Vienna Coup), and play for an automatic heart/club squeeze.

[johnu]

You are missing the 7213 and 7312 and 7303 and 7204 and 7402 shapes. (Though I am giving them the benefit of doubt that they can read it when E has 74 hands)

 

Those were covered by the "etc" :) but I should have included the short diamond hands in the non-etc list. I was just disagreeing that only 6 card spade suits were relevant.

 

In the OP's original post, East had Jx of hearts so I'm not sure why 4 heart tricks weren't automatic.

[johnu]

I will win and lead a low club, intending to duck a club, rectifying the count, then win any return, cash the club Ace (Vienna Coup), and play for an automatic heart/club squeeze.

 

Which doesn't work if East has ♣K(xx) and < 4 hearts, but does work if East doesn't have ♣K (or has < 3 clubs).

[Winstonm]

Which doesn't work if East has ♣K(xx) and < 4 hearts, but does work if East doesn't have ♣K (or has < 3 clubs).

 

In that case, the squeeze may not operate but the hand can still be made - and with a much better count on it. :) On the other hand, if I lead a club to the Q and it loses, I can now only use the squeeze if one player holds only 2 clubs.

 

I'm not sure which is the right play. I only know what I would do at the table - and a squeeze is always more fun that leading low to the Queen. :P

 

As to why I come to this conclusion, it is pretty simply. RHO should have 7 spades for his preempt over 2C. That leaves 6 unknown cards. LHO has 2 spades. That leaves 11 unknown cards. A priori heart split is 4-2, so LHO is more apt to hold the 4 as there is more room in that hand. That now gives LHO 4 hearts and 2 spades with RHO holding 7 spades and 2 hearts. The likelihood that LHO holds any one card - the club K - is 7-4.

 

So it seems to me the most likely holdings favors a line to play as there is a squeeze against LHO.

[johnu]

In that case, the squeeze may not operate but the hand can still be made - and with a much better count on it. :)

 

True, if you run this through a double dummy analyzer, there is always a 100% solution.

[MrAce]

 

In the OP's original post, East had Jx of hearts so I'm not sure why 4 heart tricks weren't automatic.

 

E had Jx ♥?

 

Oh man...and we have been debating this hand forever....for what? LOL

[phil_20686]

This hand seems reasonably straight forward to analyse, but in practice there are a couple of extra things to consider:

 

1) If you play a low club of the dummy at trick two the number of players who can play low smoothly enough from kxx at MP is incredibly small. As in. Maybe 40-50 defenders in the whole world might attempt it. This could just be carelessly conceding an over trick at match points. At teams, its much easier to duck, so if you are playing MP playing a low club of the dummy at trick two intending to duck if rho plays low. If you are playing teams I would basically always go up with the Q.

 

2) If you are worried about rho being good enough to duck at teams you might start by cashing four rounds of diamonds. Its hardly beyond the realm of possiblility that rho might pitch three spades and a club from a shape like 6403, worried that you have three spades. If rho has two diamonds then the hand will likely be cleared up for you when you play a club off dummy. If he is 7420 or something you won't go wrong!

 

I am guessing that you "went wrong" on this board by doing something like cashing 5d playing the ten of hearts to the K and then a club off, where upon lho won and played a heart. It can seem tempting to insert the 9 and this point, but there is really no need. The finesse isn't free and that costs you when its Jx on your right, which is a moderately likely layout. besides which, lho can see dummy and wouldn't play a heart lightly from Jxxx!