[mikeh]

I will try to repost later, with a hand diagram

At mps, partner deals and passes. Rho opens 1H and you choose 4S with A1087xxx Ax J Axx


All pass and the 2H is led, clearly a stiff

Dummy hits with a useful hand:

J9 108xxx AQxx Kx

Plan the play after RHO inserts the 7 at trick one, forcing your ace

[Tramticket]

My initial reaction is that if you can ruff a club, you have reduced your potential losers to three (two trumps and a heart). But this would not be an "interesting hand", so what can we do about West having seven clubs?

If we play the ace of spades and both opps follow low, we can cross to the club king and lead a club back towards the ace (ducking if east ruffs). But this won't work if west is void in trumps.

So a better bet is to play a small diamond to the ace and lead a trump from dummy, ducking if east plays low. We are ok if West wins. West can't exit with a trump without picking up the other honour. After any other exit, we regain the lead and play a low club to the King then a club back if east ruffs we can pick up the final trump.

[cherdano]

Tramticket, on 2020-March-04, 16:16, said:

So a better bet is to play a small diamond to the ace and lead a trump from dummy, ducking if east plays low. We are ok if West wins. West can't exit with a trump without picking up the other honour. After any other exit, we regain the lead and play a low club to the King then a club back if east ruffs we can pick up the final trump.

This won't work if West has KQ of trumps.

[mythdoc]

Is this hand interesting at MPs because the percentage plays didn’t work? At MP’s I typically don’t deviate from the odds without a good feeling why. A stiff heart alone doesn’t do that. At IMPs I’ll twist to guard against the worst.

[Tramticket]

cherdano, on 2020-March-04, 16:46, said:

This won't work if West has KQ of trumps.

Agree. But I don't think that East has enough for an opening bid in this case?

Edit: Maybe XX KQJXX KXXXX Q is just about an opener. I fail in this case.

[Cyberyeti]

Tramticket, on 2020-March-04, 16:16, said:

My initial reaction is that if you can ruff a club, you have reduced your potential losers to three (two trumps and a heart). But this would not be an "interesting hand", so what can we do about West having seven clubs?

If we play the ace of spades and both opps follow low, we can cross to the club king and lead a club back towards the ace (ducking if east ruffs). But this won't work if west is void in trumps.

So a better bet is to play a small diamond to the ace and lead a trump from dummy, ducking if east plays low. We are ok if West wins. West can't exit with a trump without picking up the other honour. After any other exit, we regain the lead and play a low club to the King then a club back if east ruffs we can pick up the final trump.

If LHO is void in trumps he is 0157 if RHO has a stiff club. Does he lead a heart with that ? Has the very real possibility that partner with say AJ109x in a 3550 flies the ace and tries to give you a ruff when he should be playing a middle card (even worse if he's void in clubs and returns the small one as a signal giving declarer 3 heart tricks).

I think I go with ♠A then try to ruff a club

[KingCovert]

Cyberyeti, on 2020-March-05, 07:43, said:

If LHO is void in trumps he is 0157 if RHO has a stiff club. Does he lead a heart with that ? Has the very real possibility that partner with say AJ109x in a 3550 flies the ace and tries to give you a ruff when he should be playing a middle card (even worse if he's void in clubs and returns the small one as a signal giving declarer 3 heart tricks).

I think I go with ♠A then try to ruff a club

I agree. This makes the most sense to me.

If trumps are breaking badly, they're almost always breaking badly offside. You don't lead a stiff from a hand that has no interest in ruffing, KQ 2 XXX XXXXXXX or KX 2 XXX XXXXXXX, for example, would not lead a heart in an auction where partner has shown hearts, this is just a bad idea, you're going to set up heart tricks sometimes and you're ruffing in such a way as to not create any additional winners. Also, consider that a spade holding like KX♠ is well positioned on the auction. You might lead your stiff from QX♠ though.

KQXX 2 XXX XXXXX or KXX 2 XXX XXXXXX would totally lead a heart though, that would create an additional spade trick. Interestingly, there is little point in leading the stiff from KQX though, not on this auction, you don't actually want a ruff.

Given the singleton lead, I'd consider it a bad idea to cater to a 3-1 trump break onside. So, the finesse in spades gains nothing. I'll cater to a singleton honour onside (pointless to finesse this), or a 2-2 break, and take a line that gives nothing up to KQXX♠, KQX♠, KXX♠, QXX♠ offside.

I'd like to be able to take a pitch using the diamonds somehow, but, it seems unlikely that LHO has a spade honour and the K♦. And, it's not necessary.

After the A♠ at trick 2, intending to play clubs after, I should have 1 heart loser, and 1 spade loser, and either a 2nd spade loser or a club ruff of the 2nd round of clubs. But, this ruff (if it ever occurs) is likely going to occur by RHO in a 2-2 break, which is absolutely fine.

[Tramticket]

Ok, I have just re-visited this post expecting to read Mike's pearl's of wisdom and realised that my initial post was silly and I did not properly read the O.P:

mikeh, on 2020-March-04, 15:15, said:

At mps, partner deals and passes. Rho opens 1H and you choose 4S with A1087xxx Ax J Axx

I apologise Mike (and others who may have followed my lead) for not noticing that it is match points. I will take another look.

[Cyberyeti]

Tramticket, on 2020-March-06, 07:10, said:

Ok, I have just re-visited this post expecting to read Mike's pearl's of wisdom and realised that my initial post was silly and I did not properly read the O.P:



I apologise Mike (and others who may have followed my lead) for not noticing that it is match points. I will take another look.

I figure making it will be above average as not everybody will be in it

[mikeh]

I’m not sure that I have any good pearls of wisdom to offer. My intermediate partner played too quickly, winning the heart and immediately going for his club ruff. He was very unlucky to have his rho ruff the second club, cash a heart, lead another heart ruffed and overruffed, and now a 3rd club let rho ruff again.

When asked later how else he should have played the hand, my advice was more or less as follows.

The lead and bidding marks hearts as 5-1. This makes it unlikely that LHO has a stiff or void trump. Not impossible (as it happens, LHO has the stiff Q), but improbable.

We have 5 spades, the red aces and 2 top clubs. A club ruff gets us to 10, so we need to plan to ruff a club. However, there is a non-trivial risk that rho has short clubs. Even 1=5=5=2 is a problem, at MPs, if we don’t play one round of spades early. He almost surely has one spade honour.

If either opp has a stiff honour, the Ace at trick 2 will usually generate an overtrick.

If spades are 2=2, the Ace at trick 2 will mean they can never score more than a heart and two trumps, and if rho is 2=5=3=3 or 2=5=2=4, we make an overtrick. Yes, we make that overtrick with his line, but the point is that the Ace at trick 2 doesn’t give up on that, which is important at MPS, while preventing a disaster should rho have a stiff club, or a bad result should he be 5=5 reds, with 1=2 blacks.

Meanwhile, on 3=1 spades, roughly half the time the stiff will be an honour, usually leading to making 5, and when either opp has KQx, we always make 4. We’d be, IMO, silly to plan to ruff a club and then hook spade, since we can’t pick up LHO having a stiff honour, which is approximately the same risk as RHO having had KQx

Playing a diamond to them Ace, then advancing and running a spade seems wrong to me. Again, we lose to a stiff honour unnecessarily. While I would not expect a stiff honour or any stiff, it’s not impossible. And any competent opp might well return a spade from Hx, eliminating our club ruff and any real hope of an overtrick.

[Tramticket]

Thanks Mike

mikeh, on 2020-March-06, 09:44, said:

Playing a diamond to them Ace, then advancing and running a spade seems wrong to me.

Yes it seems wrong to me at MPs. And on reflection wrong too (but less silly) at IMPs.

I am wondering about the chances of bringing down the diamond king in three rounds? Something like:

---

Win ace of hearts, draw one round of trumps and then a diamond to the ace. Ruff a diamond and club to the king. Ruff the third round of diamonds, ace of clubs and a club ruff. If all of this stands up we discard the ♥3 on the queen of diamonds and score 12 tricks as the cards are set up.

[mikeh]

Tramticket, on 2020-March-06, 09:57, said:

Thanks Mike



Yes it seems wrong to me at MPs. And on reflection wrong too (but less silly) at IMPs.

I am wondering about the chances of bringing down the diamond king in three rounds? Something like:

---

Win ace of hearts, draw one round of trumps and then a diamond to the ace. Ruff a diamond and club to the king. Ruff the third round of diamonds, ace of clubs and a club ruff. If all of this stands up we discard the ♥ on the queen of diamonds and score 12 tricks as the cards are set up.

Once an honour appears under the spade A, one can segue into the 'ruff out the diamond' line easily enough, but this line is so low probability that I probably would not be concerned too much about it when deciding my play at trick 1. Maybe I should, and maybe on a good day I would be: part of the problem with analyzing these hands, when asked by partner later, is to put oneself accurately in the position of declarer at trick one. Since I then knew the layout, it is not possible, imo, to be certain how one would have thought absent that knowledge.

I don't do a lot of teaching, but I do get asked questions by a number of less experienced players and, of course, am a long-time poster. I try to focus on process: how one thinks more than 'what play works' or 'what is the best play'. So here, my thinking was 'what factors should we be concerned about at trick 2' and 'what do we do about them?'

[KingCovert]

Tramticket, on 2020-March-06, 09:57, said:

I am wondering about the chances of bringing down the diamond king in three rounds? Something like:

---

Win ace of hearts, draw one round of trumps and then a diamond to the ace. Ruff a diamond and club to the king. Ruff the third round of diamonds, ace of clubs and a club ruff. If all of this stands up we discard the ♥3 on the queen of diamonds and score 12 tricks as the cards are set up.

I think the problem with a layout like this is this: Is there any serious line of play that you would take that doesn't make? 3 rounds of clubs makes, a finesse of the spades makes in that when your spade is covered, the discussed line of A♠ and then playing for the club finesse makes. Instead, if diamonds are 6-2, with LHO holding 3-1-2-7 shape, and you take your line, now you're down instead of making. (Note that you have no entries to discard your losing club on the diamond winner you've established)

This hand really just boils down to the fact that you have 5 spades, 1 heart, 1 diamond, 2 clubs, and a club ruff. If your 2nd round of clubs gets ruffed, opponents grant you 6 spades, 1 heart, 1 diamond, 1 club, and a club ruff.

The only threat to this is a 4-0 trump break, or KQX in the hand of the opponent with club shortness, who would then ruff your 2nd round of clubs (with a high trump honor) and collect your last trump on the board. But, you may now hold a club loser if you misplayed the club suit. You can guard against this by winning the King of clubs first and playing through RHO when attempting to take the 2nd round of clubs, as that is the hand most likely to have club shortness after LHO has known heart shortness. This way, your opponent cannot ruff the good A♣. Since your opponent has now spent a guaranteed winner, one of their two high trump honours, your opponent has traded their trump winner for their club winner. It's a wash.