[ahydra]

IMPs, expert opps

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(The 2NT upgrade is based mainly on the fact that EW have been bidding all the time, so I was trying to shut them out.)

East leads the ♣J (standard leads). If you duck, West overtakes with the Q and plays back the ♥6, won by East's Ace and the ♥8 comes back. Plan the play.

Spoiler

Clubs are 4-1 (singleton Q in West) as you might expect. If a second round of clubs is played then West will discard a small spade, ostensibly McKenney.

ahydra

[manudude03]

If clubs started 3-2 we are cold. So assume they don't. If that's the case then I need at least 3 diamond tricks (lacking the entries after ducking trick 1). I duck the first trick (catering for the club break), then on winning the second heart, I duck a diamond. What happens there?

[mikeh]

pretty simple problem, as I see it. There just isn't any point to doing anything but exiting a small diamond at trick 3.

[jdonn]

mikeh, on 2015-March-30, 16:16, said:

pretty simple problem, as I see it. There just isn't any point to doing anything but exiting a small diamond at trick 3.

I don't think this problem is so simple at all. For one thing, after ducking the opening lead, we aren't on lead at trick 3.

I suspect you mean you would duck a diamond at trick 4. The point is that if clubs break evenly, we can run the clubs for enough tricks, but if they don't break then we will need to rely on the diamonds. We have to lose one diamond trick (at least) if the suit is to run, and it's convenient to do so on the first or second round of the suit so that we retain control after the third round in case they don't break. That is a common theme, but on this particular hand we could just as easily try the clubs first and fall back on the diamonds second. There is no particular rush.

I think it is probably better to win the second heart and try the clubs immediately. If they break there is no problem (other than overtricks). If they don't break then I think we retain more options. We can always finesse the diamonds and duck the second round to reach a similar position anyway. But I prefer trying clubs first for a few reasons.
- We force someone to make 2 discards on the clubs if they aren't breaking. This may lead to more defensive errors, such as someone pitching a diamond they can't afford. They will know more if we duck a diamond first and allow them to clear hearts.
- If clubs break, we retain a choice of whether to take a diamond or club finesse for an overtrick. An overtrick that was lost immediately when we ducked a diamond. In fact, if we (for some reason) judged that clubs were breaking, we could play off the AK of spades and the heart winner before crossing over, playing for a spade/diamond squeeze.

There are possibly advantages to ducking a diamond before trying clubs as well, but they aren't clear to me. If someone could state any, I would love to hear them. In any case, I dispute that this is a simple problem. And we didn't even get into what to discard on the second club winner - probably a spade, making if diamonds are no worse than 4-2 and they aren't able to get in to run hearts. But it could be right to discard a diamond, for example if west has Qx 9xxxx KJT8x Q then we will be forced to make after seeing the bad diamond break if we keep our spade threat, but if we keep our diamonds then after the queen finesse he will simply have enough winners remaining to defeat us. Not simple at all.

[PhantomSac]

Man I think y'all are nuts ducking the club. And I am not saying that because I read the spoiler, I don't believe in people leading a 3 card club suit on this auction, even JT9. It seems far more likely that we just give them both a trick and a crucial tempo (and hurt our entry situation to dummy drastically) by ducking the club. They need to set up hearts and we need to set up diamonds, losing a tempo here is really a big deal. I think it is much more likely that it's something like KJx or KTx of diamonds offside with clubs 4-1 and they get hearts going than that clubs are 3-2.

Don't forget to unblock the 8 at trick 1 if you win the club also heh.

[PhantomSac]

Also worth pointing out that scoring three diamond tricks is very likely and even if clubs are 3-2 we will often make by just winning. The lead (assuming it's from 4) makes 5-1 diamonds either way a lot less likely (if opening leader had 5 he would lead it, if opening leader has 1 diamond and 4 clubs he would probably have led a 5 card major so that gives him 4414 exactly and he chose to lead the minor, even though JT9x is very nice it's possible he'd choose a major). If we had the 8 of diamonds it would be even better of course but we have the 7 so we can pick up J8/T8 onside.

But all of this assumes stuff like people leading their long suits vs 3N and preferring majors to minors in general, maybe that is an outdated concept in light of the david bird book but doesn't he argue strongly for leading majors? Even that school is probably not leading a 3 card minor vs 3N when no major suit fit was found (and in fact dummy denied a 4 card major). Just out of curiosity what % chance do the trick one duckers assign to 3-2 clubs?

[rhm]

PhantomSac, on 2015-March-30, 19:22, said:

Also worth pointing out that scoring three diamond tricks is very likely and even if clubs are 3-2 we will often make by just winning. The lead (assuming it's from 4) makes 5-1 diamonds either way a lot less likely (if opening leader had 5 he would lead it, if opening leader has 1 diamond and 4 clubs he would probably have led a 5 card major so that gives him 4414 exactly and he chose to lead the minor, even though JT9x is very nice it's possible he'd choose a major). If we had the 8 of diamonds it would be even better of course but we have the 7 so we can pick up J8/T8 onside.

But all of this assumes stuff like people leading their long suits vs 3N and preferring majors to minors in general, maybe that is an outdated concept in light of the david bird book but doesn't he argue strongly for leading majors? Even that school is probably not leading a 3 card minor vs 3N when no major suit fit was found (and in fact dummy denied a 4 card major). Just out of curiosity what % chance do the trick one duckers assign to 3-2 clubs?

The major suit bias is gone after the puppet and the 3♦ response.
I believe many experienced players tend to stay passive against a 2NT opener declaring 3NT, unless they have a good five card suit and entries, which is unlikely in the first place or unless they have a good honor sequence to lead from.
So I would not overplay the likelihood that clubs are 4-1.
From trick one East most likely has either ♣Q, ♣Q4 or ♣Q9, which are a priory almost equally likely.
So chances that West has 4 clubs is at least one third and considering that a lead from ♣JT94 is most attractive and the play of the queen increase this chance.
Your main argument is that establishing diamonds for 3 tricks is a 74% chance a priory.
But if clubs are 4-1 on an unlucky day you could loose 2 diamonds, 2 clubs and a heart. But then there is no alternative anyway.

Overall I think your line is clearly superior.
Simple looking play problems can be deceptive

Rainer Herrmann

[PhilKing]

rhm, on 2015-March-31, 06:18, said:

The major suit bias is gone after the puppet and the 3♦ response.

Rainer Herrmann

I think you may have misread it. Responder has denied a major and opener has not promised one and he has denied five - he can be 33 or 32 in the majors. He has merely denied holding 23 in the majors.

[gnasher]

jdonn, on 2015-March-30, 18:35, said:

There are possibly advantages to ducking a diamond before trying clubs as well, but they aren't clear to me. If someone could state any, I would love to hear them.

East may have ♦K singleton, with ♠Q onside.

[mikeh]

I just didn't give the problem enough thought

I don't think that the 3-2 club break is as unlikely as Josh or Justin seem to imply, but I will concede it is less likely than a priori. East may well have had simply no good lead, and J10x or J109 may seem the least likely to give away a ninth trick. Not every lead against 3N will be aggressive.

However, the argument in favour of abandoning clubs and playing on diamonds is powerful and I simply didn't see it.

[ahydra]

Full hand (sorry I couldn't post it earlier)

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I ducked the opening lead, won the second heart and tried the clubs. When that failed I left the CK in dummy (probably a mistake), took West at his word and tried a diamond to the Q, which lost. East returned her third heart and I tried for diamonds 3-3, unfortunately that didn't work either and I went two off.

At the other table declarer took the same line as me but team-mates unfortunately misdefended: West put up the D10 on the first round, and when in with the DK, East played a small diamond back to declarer's nine.

I felt like ducking the first club is correct, but then maybe is there some merit in ducking a SECOND club as well so as to eventually endplay East? Also I don't understand (legitimately - my declarer play is pretty weak) as to why it might be right to duck a diamond completely rather than finesse the 9 or Q. Would appreciate any enlightening comments

Thanks,

ahydra

[gnasher]

ahydra, on 2015-April-03, 11:48, said:

Also I don't understand (legitimately - my declarer play is pretty weak) as to why it might be right to duck a diamond completely rather than finesse the 9 or Q.

I think that the only reason anyone suggested that was because they were in hand, with only one entry to dummy. If you have, or choose to have, two entries, the correct play for four winners is to lead one to the 9.

[kuhchung]

I thought south was declarer and the club suit lay the other way

Good thing I posted no response because bridge is hard

[johnu]

kuhchung, on 2015-April-03, 12:42, said:

I thought south was declarer and the club suit lay the other way

Good thing I posted no response because bridge is hard

On BBO forums, North or East are usually declarer. If declarer isn't specified, it's the hand with 14 cards

[Lovera]

Here ducking twice you are sure to fullfil the contract because need you only two tricks having 2 wiinners in spade, heart and club and one in diamond. In this situation when an ace is in a hand of any opp and (more) there is an impasse you must first eliminate ace (seen as reentry for longness) and when this suit is sectioned try for impasse. It has to consider that S has no entry when A and K of club when lead and if suit is blocked you can move suits only from dummy.

[KurtGodel]

I must confess at the table I would have ducked the first club and then tried ducking a diamond after in with a heart. Although it seems like Justin's analysis is much better, it seems very unlikely that we can't build 5 diamond tricks.

It seems like to lead a club on this auction almost guarantees four of them.