[MrAce]

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MP. You are declarer (North)

T1- Lead ♥9 to West's A
T2 -♥ T and East discards ♦8, you win in south.
T3-You play a ♠ to K everyone follows.
T4-You play a ♣ to Q and wins.
T5-You cash ♣A and East drops K.

How do you continue? ( explain if you disagree with the previous moves)

Spoiler

If you play 3rd ♣, West wins and plays a ♦

As easy as it is, 11 out of 15 declarers went down, surprisingly, which brings you a 90 % board if you make.

[kenberg]

Spoiler

I guess it all depends on which club you led at T4.

[MrAce]

kenberg, on 2016-August-09, 19:07, said:

Spoiler

I guess it all depends on which club you led at T4.

This is the question I asked about if you disagree with the previous tricks and what do we do now? We needed to play clubs in a way that remaining club in North is smaller than the club in South. Thus we should keep the ♣2 in North.

Assume you did not do this, because it is more fun and you have T in North and 5 in South, what now? (Frankly, when I played it, I played too fast that I missed it but did not think it was important because pretty much I figured the entire deal at T2. and you can do without arranging clubs)

[shyams]

I count my tricks again at this point (in the bag: us=4, them=1; top tricks us=?, them=? ), and then...

Spoiler

... lead the third club, conceding the trick to defence.
If they win and lead a trump, I no longer have to worry about losing a trump trick. I will score 3 top spades, 1 winner club, 1 winner heart, and have enough time to ruff a heart high in the North hand.(4+6=10)
If they win and lead a red suit, I can play along cross ruff lines to score at least 5 more trumps + one other winner OR all six trumps + no other winner.

[MrAce]

shyams, on 2016-August-09, 21:28, said:

I count my tricks again at this point (in the bag: us=4, them=1; top tricks us=?, them=? ), and then...

Spoiler

... lead the third club, conceding the trick to defence.
If they win and lead a trump, I no longer have to worry about losing a trump trick. I will score 3 top spades, 1 winner club, 1 winner heart, and have enough time to ruff a heart high in the North hand.(4+6=10)
If they win and lead a red suit, I can play along cross ruff lines to score at least 5 more trumps + one other winner OR all six trumps + no other winner.

They will not play trump. They will play ♦ when they win 3rd ♣, go from there. Telling you will play cross ruff does not really help and you go down that way.

[alok c]

Delete.

[MrAce]

alok c, on 2016-August-09, 22:55, said:

Delete.

Ok here is the thing. West takes 3rd ♣ and plays ♦

East did not ruff first ♥ and followed first spade. That means he has 4 spades (with 3-2♠ no problem anyway) So we know he has 4♠+2♣+1♥ which makes him hold 6♦. We are down to

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Take it from here. You are in South because they played ♦ after 3rd ♣ and you had to ruff in south.

[kenberg]

MrAce, on 2016-August-09, 20:04, said:

This is the question I asked about if you disagree with the previous tricks and what do we do now? We needed to play clubs in a way that remaining club in North is smaller than the club in South. Thus we should keep the ♣2 in North.

Assume you did not do this, because it is more fun and you have T in North and 5 in South, what now? (Frankly, when I played it, I played too fast that I missed it but did not think it was important because pretty much I figured the entire deal at T2. and you can do without arranging clubs)

OK.'ll get back to it in a bit.
There are far more hands than I can count where halfway through I think "Good grief, I should known to have saved that deuce" so I figured that was the point. If I saved the deuce I ruff the diamond, pplay off all trumps ending (necessarily) in had, go back to the board in clubs and cash the remaining high heart. Four spades, one ruff. three clubs, two hearts.
But back to T2.
First some coffee.

[alok c]

1.♠Q
2.Ruff a♦.
3.♥Q,Discard a♦.

[The_Badger]

Hello MrAce,

When East discards a ♦ at trick 2, I'm more inclined to ruff a small ♥ (at trick 3) with a spade honour, and then try the ♣ finesse. I feel it keeps things more flexible than drawing a round of trumps, especially if you now think that East has 4♠s in his hand, too

Just a personal opinion, but if a hand looks like a crossruff - and this one certainly does - I wouldn't be losing a potential trump trick by drawing one round of trumps. The opponents have given you back a tempo by allowing you to win the 2nd ♥ in dummy.

If the ♣ finesse loses, then its back to the drawing board, but feel at least you have given yourself that extra chance.

[kenberg]

I am still thinking about the end position shown. I do not regard it as easy at all. Obviously there are five winners, but no easy way to take them. I'll give it more thought, but while I was going over it the following occurred to me. Suppose the clubs are such that they cannot be unblocked, all spots in hand higher than all spots on the board. After the club finesse wins, how about a small club from the board? As the cards lie, E is in and has only spades and diamonds. Again the plan is to ruff a diamond, draw trump ending in hand, get back to the board in clubs and take the remaining heart for ten tricks. Maybe E started with Kxx? So 4=1=5=3? Could be. But so what? If W is allowed to hold the trick with the J he has only red cards left. If he returns a heart you give them their ruff, they get one heart, one club, one ruff, you get the rest ( after they get their ruff, you will be able to ruff a diamonds in dummy). If, in with the club J, W returns a diamond, ruff it, draw trump, go back to the board in clubs and take your heart.

Added: I see this line fails if E started with KJX in clubs. Club to Q, duck to club K/J, another club forces me to take my A, blocking the suit. Not A bad line though.


I will work on this end position, but so far I do not see it. Preserving the club deuce seems easy, finessing the club and then playing a small club seems reasonable, both are things I might not see at the table but later would think that I should have seen. But I have already put more time in with the end position than would be allowed at a table and I do not yet see it.

Which makes it a good problem. Clearly I have a blind spot here.And my congrats to alok.

[kenberg]

deleted

[kenberg]

alok c, on 2016-August-10, 05:40, said:

1.♠Q
2.Ruff a♦.
3.♥Q,Discard a♦.

Yes, this seems to work.One of the many things that I would feel later I should have seen.

[MrAce]

Alok got it right.

I played ♠ T from south and covered with J in North. Saw the 4-1 break as predicted. (did not really matter if it was 3-2 at this moment) Ruffed a ♦ and discarded my last ♦ on ♥Q.

Holding ♠ Q8 and ♣T in hand, Easy ruffed with his 3rd trump.

@Ken: The point you made about ♣ spots was important one that I was expecting to hear. You did good to catch it.

Thanks for the replies everyone.

[kenberg]

And thanks for the problem. The I/A forum is exactly the right place for it. Probably even the best at times say "I should have spotted that". But this hand is something that we can all look at and either get or feel we should get.