[kereru67]

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I have my own opinion but I'll see what you guys think first.

[DavidKok]

Could I get an explanation of the auction?

[kereru67]

DavidKok, on 2024-November-22, 04:18, said:

Could I get an explanation of the auction?

Fairly standard, 2♣ game force, 2♥ is a biddable suit, 4nt blackwood, 5♣ no aces, 6♦ 1 king.

[P_Marlowe]

kereru67, on 2024-November-22, 04:57, said:

Fairly standard, 2♣ game force, 2♥ is a biddable suit, 4nt blackwood, 5♣ no aces, 6♦ 1 king.

So in other Words Dummy should show up with KTxxx in hearts.

I would go with a spade.

[TMorris]

10 ♦ for me, trying not to give away a trick

[mikeh]

Lol at this ‘standard’ auction…to NA eyes it’s very non-standard. It’s common in NA for a suit response to promise 2/3 top honours, or AKQ, 5+ length, and most play keycard over that and most play specific kings.

Ok, now that we know what the auction means….we can place north with Kxxxx in hearts and probably nothing meaningful extra.

Either declarer has a truly huge hand or he thinks he has a long running minor…AKQJxx(x). If the latter, then if it’s clubs, he’s probably right and if it’s diamonds we’ll need a lucky layout. Say 9xxxx for partner. But on those layouts, I’m struggling to find a losing lead, other than hearts.

What about AKJ Ax AKQJ9 AKQ? No defence…I’m squeezed in the majors on any lead. AKJ Ax AKQJ2 AKQ? If dummy has xxxx Kxxxx x xxx, a spade lead concedes the 12th trick and sets up the squeeze for the 13th.

I’ve gone back and forth on this, but trying to stay within the bounds of what would be permissible in a long team match, where taking five minutes on this decision would be acceptable. I’ve concluded that we need to be as passive as possible. I thought that meant diamonds. But then I flashed on A Ax AKJxxxxx AK….with partner holding Qxx. To me, it’s fractionally less likely that a club can cost….cost a trick? Maybe. Cost the contract by setting up a club suit that needs a finesse? Less likely.

So a club, without much confidence. Second choice…diamond. I’d rank this as club 90 diamond 80 spade 10 heart 0

[smerriman]

mikeh, on 2024-November-22, 13:04, said:

I’d rank this as club 90 diamond 80 spade 10 heart 0

I would have picked a club too, just in case it was a bad diamond break that was the means to beating the contract.

But just to play devil's advocate.. as ridiculous as it sounds, assuming declarer doesn't have 3 hearts for not raising, what hand could declarer have where a low heart lead costs the contract? I'm struggling to think of one, since it only costs a trick if dummy has an outside entry which likely dooms us anyway (or has no effect if declarer needs diamonds), though probably missing something obvious.

[mikeh]

smerriman, on 2024-November-22, 13:29, said:

I would have picked a club too, just in case it was a bad diamond break that was the means to beating the contract.

But just to play devil's advocate.. as ridiculous as it sounds, assuming declarer doesn't have 3 hearts for not raising, what hand could declarer have where a low heart lead costs the contract? I'm struggling to think of one, since it only costs a trick if dummy has an outside entry which likely dooms us anyway (or has no effect if declarer needs diamonds), though probably missing something obvious.

Depends on what I think/know about the opps. As a rule I tend to assume that players I don’t know aren’t very good (ok, so I’m arrogant, lol). But in my experience I usually have a rough idea of their ability by the time we’ve played two boards.

Even with my rule, I’m not assuming that declarer would conceal heart support, if only because surely he could set hearts as trump and find out about the queen? He’d have to be an idiot or novice not to do so, and (additionally) few novices would bid a grand on such an auction unless they had 14 tricks, lol.

Plus, if he needs the heart suit, how can it gain to lead it? Maybe it only blows one trick right away but even then it could be (a) the 13 th trick……xx K109xx xx xxxx opposite AK Axx AKQJ9 AKQ

Or it could set up a squeeze…..Jxx K109xx xx xxx opposite AK Axx AKQJ2 AKQ. On a minor lead, the count is wrong for a major suit squeeze. I can afford to pitch 3 spades and a heart on the run of the minors, but if I lead a low heart, now he has 12 winners and I’m crushed.

[smerriman]

mikeh, on 2024-November-22, 14:20, said:

Plus, if he needs the heart suit, how can it gain to lead it? Maybe it only blows one trick right away but even then it could be (a) the 13 th trick……xx K109xx xx xxxx opposite AK Axx AKQJ9 AKQ

Or it could set up a squeeze…..Jxx K109xx xx xxx opposite AK Axx AKQJ2 AKQ. On a minor lead, the count is wrong for a major suit squeeze. I can afford to pitch 3 spades and a heart on the run of the minors, but if I lead a low heart, now he has 12 winners and I’m crushed.

Right, but in both of those examples opener has 3 hearts, which I agree he'd have to be bonkers to conceal. I just looking for an example of a hand where declarer wasn't crazy, but a low heart lead is bad (for you to give it a score of 0). In all of your original guesses as to his hand, a low heart lead works fine. Not that I would have chosen it.

[kereru67]

OK for a bit more context, N/S are above average club players. Their bidding is not necessarily 100% correct. However club players notoriously don't bid slams when they're there.

Based on this I have to place S with all 4 aces and 3 kings, N with the 4th king.

The number one priority is to give nothing away, so the lead to avoid at all costs is ♠. You're not trying to set up a long suit, you're just trying to eventually take a defensive trick after declarer has run their likely long minor. ♠ lead will cost unless partner happens to have the J♠, and odds are against.

The minors are a 50/50 proposition. Most likely declarer has a run in one of them, but partner might have a hold in the other. If you happen to lead the suit where declarer has a run that will be ok, but if you guess wrong you might wreck partner's honor holding.

I think ♥ is the best lead. Low ♥ will only work if partner has 10♥, a 1 in 3 chance. That leaves a high heart lead. It will work if (a) partner has the 10♥ (b) declarer has the K♥ © Declarer misguesses a finesse. You already know declarer has the Ace. Lead J♥ instead of the Q♥ to encourage a wrong finesse.

Edit:Want to see all 4 hands?

[mikeh]

kereru67, on 2024-November-22, 14:52, said:

OK for a bit more context, N/S are above average club players. Their bidding is not necessarily 100% correct. However club players notoriously don't bid slams when they're there.

Based on this I have to place S with all 4 aces and 3 kings, N with the 4th king.

The number one priority is to give nothing away, so the lead to avoid at all costs is ♠. You're not trying to set up a long suit, you're just trying to eventually take a defensive trick after declarer has run their likely long minor. ♠ lead will cost unless partner happens to have the J♠, and odds are against.

The minors are a 50/50 proposition. Most likely declarer has a run in one of them, but partner might have a hold in the other. If you happen to lead the suit where declarer has a run that will be ok, but if you guess wrong you might wreck partner's honor holding.

I think ♥ is the best lead. Low ♥ will only work if partner has 10♥, a 1 in 3 chance. That leaves a high heart lead. It will work if (a) partner has the 10♥ (b) declarer has the K♥ © Declarer misguesses a finesse. You already know declarer has the Ace. Lead J♥ instead of the Q♥ to encourage a wrong finesse.

Edit:Want to see all 4 hands?

I think this is very bad. The problem is that when dummy has K10xxx and declarer Ax, as the bidding makes likely (north has a 'biddable heart suit') then the heart suit is only important if declarer doesn't have 13 top tricks. So....what sort of hand can he have where he thinks that he probably has 13 winners opposite Kxxxx in hearts? (as an aside, low frequency....sometimes dummy will hold K9xxxx and your partner the stiff 10...after which the reasoning below applies.. but a low heart would work...not that I'm suggesting a low heart, but it has to be better than an honour...adding to the aside, the odds of partner holding the heart 10, either stiff or 10x, are not 1 in 3 as you suggest. Did you really think....there are three hands in which it could be, so its 1 in 3 partner has it? Think again. If north has 5 hearts, 4 of them are 10 or lower and partner has 2 and opener must have one small heart, or he can't be sure he can score dummy's king. So the opps hold 5 or 6 spot cards and partner 2. If north has only 5 hearts, and if he thinks Kxxxx is 'biddable' rather than needing K10xxx, then the odds are 2/7 that he has the 10. If north has 6 hearts, then the odds are 1/7.)


And which of those hands will prove disappointing? Pretty much any time he has a long minor and our partner has a slow stopper. That could be either minor, but its slightly more likely to be diamonds, because of our being 1=2 minors. Plus, because we have 2 clubs, his suit almost always will run if its clubs.

But that's a bit of a side issue. The real issue is that he will always win the heart lead in hand (assuming an honour is led) and then expect to run 13 winners, with the aid of his long suit. When and if partner shows up with a stopper, he will be able to infer that you have heart length, especially if he cashes 3 clubs. Then, he simply has no choice but to play you for QJxx, wondering whether you really are capable of out-thinking yourself to lead the J from....what? It'll be very difficult for him to play you for anything else once you show with 10 cards in the majors! With Jxx in hearts, that gives you 7312 shape, and you'd lead a spade all day rather than Jxx in hearts, and if you held Jx, then you have 8 spades!!!!!

If your cute (not to me, I think it's silly but I infer that you think its cute)lead worked then something strange is going on, and/or declarer misplayed the contract.


btw, the spade lead doesn't cost if declarer has AK tight...quite reasonable on the auction....with AKx or AKJ, where does he think his third round spade loser is going? Its not as if he can expect a pitch on a long suit in dummy....unless he (in NA, for sure and he's be right) thinks 2H shows AQ/AK/KQ....so he thinks dummy will have KQxxx(x) in hearts. Now, AKJ Ax AKQJ10 AKQ is a routine 7N, but why he didn't raise hearts and then keycard (intending to play notrump) is beyond me, other than that he is only a club level player.

[kereru67]

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These are the 4 hands. My partner led a ♠. Eventually I had to discard a ♣ and give away the 13th trick to a marked finesse. ♥ or ♦ works on this distribution. I will still hold to the opinion that anything is better then ♠. And yes, 2♦ was the correct response with 4 (5 at a stretch) hcp.

[mikeh]

It seems that you think your partner made a mistake rather than being unlucky, and you were looking for confirmation that your tricky heart honour would have worked.

The auction was a joke. And north didn’t have a ‘biddable heart suit’ as that term would usually be used, hence opening leader is going to be misled when trying to work out the best

Btw, a club lead beats the contract as well…unless east is foolish enough to cover the Jack when declarer plays that at trick one…covering is what’s known as a ‘zero play’. It is often irrelevant but never right…iow, covering has zero chance of working while ducking has at least a small chance…and you can in fact know, at the table, that if declarer has Axx, ducking has to be right. Heck, you can even take your time to work it out.

[kereru67]

 mikeh, on 2024-November-22, 21:35, said:

It seems that you think your partner made a mistake rather than being unlucky, and you were looking for confirmation that your tricky heart honour would have worked.

The auction was a joke. And north didn’t have a ‘biddable heart suit’ as that term would usually be used, hence opening leader is going to be misled when trying to work out the best

Btw, a club lead beats the contract as well…unless east is foolish enough to cover the Jack when declarer plays that at trick one…covering is what’s known as a ‘zero play’. It is often irrelevant but never right…iow, covering has zero chance of working while ducking has at least a small chance…and you can in fact know, at the table, that if declarer has Axx, ducking has to be right. Heck, you can even take your time to work it out.

♣ lead doesn't work, west will be squeezed in ♥ and ♠.
.

[mikeh]

 kereru67, on 2024-November-22, 21:50, said:

♣ lead doesn't work, west will be squeezed in ♥ and ♠.
.

Correct. Thanks.

[Ranmit]

 kereru67, on 2024-November-22, 19:00, said:

Eventually I had to discard a ♣ and give away the 13th trick to a marked finesse.

Noob Question: Why is this a marked finesse? It would appear that S would have to (eventually) guess its location?

[smerriman]

 Ranmit, on 2024-November-24, 14:24, said:

Noob Question: Why is this a marked finesse? It would appear that S would have to (eventually) guess its location?

It's not, unless West lazily throws away both clubs, which sounds about right given everything else that went wrong.

[pescetom]

 kereru67, on 2024-November-22, 19:00, said:

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These are the 4 hands. My partner led a ♠. Eventually I had to discard a ♣ and give away the 13th trick to a marked finesse. ♥ or ♦ works on this distribution. I will still hold to the opinion that anything is better then ♠. And yes, 2♦ was the correct response with 4 (5 at a stretch) hcp.

I would prefer 2♥ artificial negative as a response by N, but it depends upon their agreements.
If it was explained as natural then NS are clearly incompetent (and unlucky to face such an extreme hand), but you still have to decide to what point and which of the two.
I would lead a low heart, the alternative is the Q.

[mikeh]

 smerriman, on 2024-November-24, 14:58, said:

It's not, unless West lazily throws away both clubs, which sounds about right given everything else that went wrong.

After the spade lead, south runs 3 spades, two hearts, 5 diamonds. Even if speedy conceals that he led from a six card suit, declarer just watches what east discards. East follows to 3 spades, 4 diamonds, and 2 hearts, reducing to 4 cards. He knows that he need not hold a spade, so he’d pitch it if he had one. He knows he doesn’t need to keep a heart…even if west didn’t give count and even if east held the heart Q, he can assume that declarer would have raised hearts with AKx or AKJ. So he’d pitch a heart. Unless east is playing a very deep game, which I doubt given the context, the forced club pitch strongly points to his having started with 4 clubs. Thus, while not marked in the sense of being a sure thing (the usual meaning, but wrong here) the club hook is a 2-1 favourite….ast was dealt twice as many clubs as west, so is twice as likely to hold the queen

[Ranmit]

 mikeh, on 2024-November-24, 17:39, said:

After the spade lead, south runs 3 spades, two hearts, 5 diamonds. Even if speedy conceals that he led from a six card suit, declarer just watches what east discards. East follows to 3 spades, 4 diamonds, and 2 hearts, reducing to 4 cards. He knows that he need not hold a spade, so he’d pitch it if he had one. He knows he doesn’t need to keep a heart…even if west didn’t give count and even if east held the heart Q, he can assume that declarer would have raised hearts with AKx or AKJ. So he’d pitch a heart. Unless east is playing a very deep game, which I doubt given the context, the forced club pitch strongly points to his having started with 4 clubs. Thus, while not marked in the sense of being a sure thing (the usual meaning, but wrong here) the club hook is a 2-1 favourite….ast was dealt twice as many clubs as west, so is twice as likely to hold the queen

If this inference is available to S, it is available to W as well. So W could just as easily pitch a club around the time E is 'forced' to pitch a club (or even earlier). How would S determine who is being forced in their ♣ discards?