Jaz Hands - Board 14

Board 14
Opponents vulnerable

This week, we continue with Jazlene's Mixed Team match. Here is Hope's discussion of today's deal on YouTube:

♠ 7 4  ♥ 6 5 4  ♦ A 10 5 2  ♣ K Q J 3

We'll start the board in Jazlene's seat. RHO opens one diamond. You pass. LHO bids one spade, partner overcalls with two hearts, and RHO passes. You bid two spades to show your limit raise, and LHO bids three clubs. Partner bids three notrump, which RHO doubles. You have a source of tricks in clubs and bad trumps. And your only ruffing value is suspect, since partner probably has secondary spade values, so you opt to play three notrump. LHO has other ideas, however. He pulls to four clubs. Partner bids four hearts, and RHO doubles again. Everyone passes. RHO leads the eight of clubs.

Now we switch over to Gideon's seat for the play.

	NORTH Jazlene ♠ 7 4 ♥ 6 5 4 ♦ A 10 5 2 ♣ K Q J 3
	SOUTH Gideon ♠ A 5 3 ♥ Q 10 9 8 7 2 ♦ K 8 ♣ A 2

West	North	East	South
Desy	Jazlene	Paulus	Gideon
1 ♦	Pass	1 ♠	2 ♥
Pass	2 ♠	3 ♣	3 NT
Double	Pass	4 ♣	4 ♥
Double	(All pass)

The opponents have done a lot of bidding and doubled you twice with a mere 17 HCP. Obviously East has a lot shape, at least six-five in the black suits. But what is West doubling on? She must have all three heart honors, probably fourth. So we've got three heart losers for starters. To make this, we need to pitch both of our spade losers on clubs. Three notrump was the right idea. In that contract, we can duck one spade and hold our losses to one spade and three hearts.

Unfortunately, this contract is problematic. Let's give West

♠ x x  ♥ A K J x  ♦ Q J x x x  ♣ x x

Upon winning the first heart, West will shift to a spade. Now we can't avoid a spade loser. But she doesn't know we have six hearts, so maybe we can sneak a heart through. If we lead a low heart and she ducks, we can cash two clubs and pitch a spade. She ruffs and switches to spades. Now we win and play a diamond to dummy to pitch our last spade on the fourth club. All she gets are her three trump tricks.

East plays the ten of clubs. We take take ace and lead the deuce of hearts. No good. West hops with the jack, and East pitches the deuce of spades. West shifts to the ten of spades, and East overtakes with the king. We can't avoid a spade loser, so might as well duck this. Could West have a stiff spade? No. She would have led it in preference to a club. And East wouldn't have bothered bidding clubs with king-queen-jack seventh of spades.

We duck. East plays the queen of spades. We take the ace and ruff a spade in dummy. Down one.

The full deal:

	NORTH Jazlene ♠ 7 4 ♥ 6 5 4 ♦ A 10 5 2 ♣ K Q J 3
WEST Desy ♠ 10 6 ♥ A K J 3 ♦ Q J 7 6 4 3 ♣ 8		EAST Paulus ♠ K Q J 9 8 2 ♥ -- ♦ 9 ♣ 10 9 7 6 5 4
	SOUTH Gideon ♠ A 5 3 ♥ Q 10 9 8 7 2 ♦ K 8 ♣ A 2

Surprisingly, that was a stiff club. Why didn't East play a club back for down two? I could understand a diamond shift, playing declarer for

♠ A x x  ♥ A 10 9 x x x  ♦ Q x   ♣ A x

After a club return, West ruffs with a natural trump trick and can't stop us from pitch our diamond loser, so we're down only one. A diamond shift sets up a diamond trick for down two. But I don't see how a spade continuation can ever be right.

At the other table, the auction began the same way, but over North's cue-bid, East chose to rebid three spades rather than show his club suit. South bid four hearts, and West doubled.

West then tried a sneak attack. Instead of leading her stiff club, she led her doubleton spade. Ostensibly, this lead is a mistake, since it allows South to duck, then ruff his spade in dummy, getting out for down one. But it had the effect of misleading South about the layout. With East never bidding clubs, South never envisioned a stiff club on his left. It was a stiff spade he was worried about. East had bid three spades with no high cards other than the king-queen-jack of spades. Would he do that with only six spades? Further, wouldn't a stiff spade make West's double of four hearts more attractive? If East ducked the spade, then West ruffed out his ace, he would be down two in a cold contract. If West did have a stiff spade, he could make this by winning the first trick and driving the heart honors, eventually pitching both his spades on dummy's clubs.

He went for it. He won the first spade. Then he did something foolish. He crossed to dummy with a club to lead a heart, eventually losing three hearts, two spades, and a club ruff for down three. Even forgetting about the double, declarer knows West has the ace and king of hearts for her opening bid. So it never gains to lead hearts from the table. He should have just played the queen of hearts from his hand at trick two. But it made no difference. Had he done that, West could draw dummy's trumps, lead a spade to partner, pitch her stiff club on the third round of spades, then get a club ruff. Still down three. The sneak attack worked.

Jaz's team thus picked up nine imps and found themselves in the lead by two.