Board 31

Board 31
Our side vulnerable

♠ J ♥ K 10 9 7 4 ♦ Q J 9 7 2 ♣ 9 4

No action appeals at this vulnerability, so I pass in first seat. LHO opens one notrump, and partner overcalls with two spades, Cappelletti, showing spades and a minor. I can guess which one.

I'm begrudgingly playing Cappelletti with Jack (sorry, Mike), because experience has shown me that it doesn't understand Astro. Why anyone would play any conventional method over the opponents' notrump openings other than Astro is beyond me. It's the only method that allows you to bid with 5-4's or 4-4-4-1's and has follow-ups to let you sort out the overcaller's relative suit lengths. Perhaps that's actually why more people don't play it. Other methods generally don't require you to define your bids past the overcaller's initial action. Astro requires understandings about the later auction and about how to scramble if the opponents start doubling. Most casual partnerships aren't up to this.

It's also difficult to find documentation on how Astro works. The best write-up can be found in "Bridge in the Sixties, Part III," by Rosler, Stern, and Allinger, in the December, 1960 issue of The Bridge World and in "Astro Revisited," by the same authors, in the January, 1962 issue. Copyrights prohibit me from reprinting those articles. But, for anyone who is interested, I can offer you the pages from my partnership notebook: Partnership Notes on Astro.

Over two spades, RHO bids three notrump, which denies either four hearts or a spade stopper. Three notrump ends the auction, and partner leads the six of spades:

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

West	North	East	South
		Pass	1 NT
2 ♠1	3 NT2	(All pass)
1Spades and a minor
2No four-card heart suit, no stopper

Partner has from seven to nine high-card point. By the rule of eleven, I know declarer has three spades higher than the seven. Declarer's likeliest pattern is 4-3-2-4. As I've mentioned in earlier posts, it often helps you to defend if you make a guess as to how the early play will go. If the play doesn't go that way, a bell goes off and you are alerted to the fact that there's something funny going on. If you don't make this guess, the bell may fail to ring and you may miss important inferences.

My expectation on this deal is that declarer will win the spade, cross to the club ace, and lead a heart to the jack. He will then cash whatever black-suit tricks he can, then play ace, king, and a diamond, forcing me to lead away from the king of hearts. If he doesn't have the heart jack, the play will probably go similarly except for the heart finesse.

Declarer plays the deuce from dummy, I play my jack, and declarer wins with the queen. Declarer leads the eight of diamonds to the king, partner playing the ten. That bell you hear ringing is what I was talking about earlier. He needs the diamond entry later for the endplay. Why is he playing a diamond to the king instead of a club to the ace? Perhaps he thinks partner's second suit is diamonds, and clubs is the suit he plans on endplaying me with? Even so, it doesn't hurt to use the club entry now. There must be some reason he can't afford to release the club ace, and it probably pertains to how he intends to play clubs later on. Until I know more about the hand, I won't know the reason, but I store this inference away for later consideration. For now, I drop the queen of diamonds to help partner count declarer's high cards. I don't want partner placing me with a club honor.

Declarer plays the four of spades from dummy. More tintinnabulation. If declarer wanted to play spades, why did he need to get to dummy to do so? Perhaps he wasn't using the diamond as an entry. Perhaps he was simply extracting an exit card from partner's hand, preparing to endplay him in hearts and clubs (thinking he has the heart king). But why cash the diamond king instead of the ace? Perhaps he needs the entry to his hand later? That might also explain why he didn't cash both diamonds.

One thing I can be fairly sure about: Either (1) declarer doesn't have the jack of hearts or (2) he has the jack but two heart tricks are sufficient to see him home. If he has the jack and needs three heart tricks, he wouldn't be playing this way. In case (2), we're not beating this, so I might as well assume case (1). I want partner to know that it's safe for him to lead hearts from his jack, so I discard the heart ten. Declarer plays the eight of spades (leaving him with one card higher than the seven), and partner wins with the king of spades. Partner cashes the spade ace. That makes eight high-card points (counting the jack of hearts). He has at most the jack of clubs in addition. I discard the diamond jack (present count), and declarer follows with the nine.

So partner began with six spades, which would make him 6-1-1-5. (Surely he wouldn't bother showing a second suit of jack fourth when he had ace-king sixth of spades.) Whatever declarer was up to, whether a fratricide squeeze or a throw-in, he was apparently hoping partner had started with only five spades. Declarer is going down at least one. How many tricks does he have after partner cashes his spades? One spade, two diamonds, one heart, and three clubs. That's only seven tricks, so we can conceivable beat this two. Declarer would have been able to squeeze me in the red suits, using the six of hearts in his hand as a threat, if he had saved dummy's diamond entry. The only way he can take an eighth trick now is in the club suit. If he has KQ108, he can either cash his tricks, playing me for jack doubleton or he can lead the ten from his hand, playing me for nine doubleton. There's not much I can do about that except never pitch a club. Technically, I can afford one pitch from either holding. But, psychologically, declarer is probably more apt to play me for the jack than the nine if I never pitch one. It turns out it doesn't matter. Declarer doesn't have the ten of clubs, and, eventually, he finishes down two. The full deal:

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

I'm still not sure what declarer was up to. At the other table, declarer cashes both diamonds. (That East played the deuce under the king. Perhaps my declarer was planning on cashing both diamonds, but, for some reason, he changed his mind when he saw my queen.) West pitches a club. Declarer now cashes three clubs and exits with a club, hoping to endplay West in hearts for down one. It doesn't work. Down two for a push.

A good blog deal, but a lousy problem hand. I had no critical decisions at all, but it was still a fertile deal for discussing what to think about as you defend.

Me: +100
Jack +100

Score on Board 31: 0 IMPs
Total: +75 IMPs