Kaitlyn S, on 2017-July-05, 08:21, said:
Lead from 75, Q7432, AKJ2, T5 update from Bridgewinners:
The high diamond leaders have taken the lead! There are 20 of them.
19 votes for a low heart.
1 vote for the ♥7.
3 votes for "I would have led a low heart but you convinced me to lead the H7."
2 votes for "I would have led a high diamond but you convinced me to lead the H7."
2 votes for "I'm not sure."
15 abstentions.
6 votes for "other".
I suspect that I will no longer gain any support for the H7 since Kit Woolsey stated that if dummy had ♥J9x and declarer had ♥AT, partner would not play the ♥K and might cede the ninth trick. Apparently he has a far different opinion than I do about the likelihood of declarer getting nine tricks without the benefit of a heart trick. He suggests leading the ♥Q which can hardly cost if declarer has two hearts - when partner either sees the ♥J in dummy or later from declarer's hand, he'll know that it was from queen empty.
However, this does mean that a significant number of people would lead the ♥3 or ♥2 which makes a lot of my earlier posts (which assume partner should lead the ♥7 when you have four cashing diamond tricks) invalid. However, I still believe that playing declarer for ♥Qx is more likely to win than playing declarer for five small diamonds.
I always appreciate the work you do on analysis - thanks. At the same time, isn't it possible that the problem is not really about the cards we can see but about the opponents' bidding? OP stated: IMP pairs, opps are good club players.
What does good club player mean? What are the agreements - if any - about rebids after 4th suit forcing? Is a partial stop enough to bid 2NT? Is a full stop required? Or is 2NT simply shape showing? Lots of questions, few answers.
Without arguing that my bidding methods are best, I simply follow what this bidding should mean in my understanding - at least Qxx of hearts but more likely Ax. To me, a strong argument for this position (that a stopper is held) is that opener bid NT twice and responder passed 3N with stiff K.
Unless there was a misunderstanding, I would think opener would raise to 4S rather than bid 2NT/3NT with Jx, Qx in the majors.
So the board layout was like this.
Mr Ace, Phil, and co return a ♥ to defeat the contract
But I switch to ♦s and let it home with overtricks
Story of my life