The Gargoyle Chronicles: Match 2

Sunday, August 29, 2010

Match 2 - Board 18

Board 18
Our side vulnerable

♠ A K 10 9 ♥ 5 4 2 ♦ K ♣ A Q J 9 4

I open one club in second seat. LHO bids one diamond, and partner bids one notrump. In the post mortem, Jack will tell me I should bid two spades at this point. I disagree. I think two spades should suggest doubt about notrump. With three hearts and the diamond king, notrump looks like the right strain to me. The only question is how high to raise. Point count undervalues this hand because of the concentrated values. Against that, honors in the opponents' suit are worth less when partner shows values there as well. I decide the hand is worth only two notrump. Partner goes on to three, and West leads the nine of diamonds.

	NORTH ♠ A K 10 9 ♥ 5 4 2 ♦ K ♣ A Q J 9 4

	SOUTH ♠ Q 7 3 ♥ Q 10 6 ♦ J 6 4 2 ♣ K 5 2

West	North	East	South
Pass	1 ♣	1 ♦	1 NT
Pass	2 NT	Pass	3 NT
(All pass)

East takes my diamond king with the ace, and I play the deuce. How easy will it be for East to find a heart switch? It depends upon his heart holding. It would probably be easier for him to switch from the king than from the ace. If he has the ace, he may think he needs that card as an entry. From his point of view, I could have

♠ x x x ♥ K Q x ♦ J x x x ♣ K x x,

in which case three rounds of diamonds would be the right defense.

East cashes the diamond queen--four--three. The fact that he's cashing the diamond queen is encouraging. If he intended to switch to hearts, he probably would have done so without setting up my diamond jack first. Is there any pitch I can make from dummy to encourage him along this path? A spade pitch suggests I don't have the spade queen. It also suggests I intend to play hearts myself. Why would I need to keep all three of dummy's hearts otherwise? Accordingly, I pitch the nine of spades.

East, to my dismay, cashes the heart ace--six--eight--four, then plays the nine of hearts. The ten is the percentage play by restricted choice. It is also the play indicated by East's defense. East would surely not cash the diamond queen if he were planning on underleading a heart honor. He cashed it because he was planning on cashing whatever red tricks he could off the top. I play the ten. West wins with the jack and cashes three more heart tricks. Down three.

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

Everyone played three notrump. Two pairs made four; everyone else was down three like me, so we get four matchpoints. Unfortunately, this drops us to second place. We seemed unbeatable only a couple of boards ago.

Did my spade pitch somehow make East suspicious? Would a routine heart pitch have been more effective? Just to make sure, I replay the board, trying each of the twelve possible discards from the dummy at trick two. East shifts to ace and a heart whatever I do.

Score on Board 18: -300 (4 MP)
Total: 141 (65.3%)
Current rank: 2nd

2 comments:

rhmAugust 30, 2010 at 4:50 AM
Why don't you have any doubts about notrump?
I would have, because of my hearts.
Partner did not negative double and opening leader is marked from the bidding with length in hearts behind partner.
3NT is quite unlikely to make if partner can not stop hearts (even if hearts broke 4-3).
Granted it would be nice to be short in hearts for bidding 2S and with 3 little hearts no alternative game contract looks promising - if partner had a heart less 4S would come home - but stopping in a part-score of a black suit instead of 3 down vulnerable will be worth a lot of match-points and almost as many IMPs as a game swing at IMPS.

Playing with Wbridge5, Wbridge5 bid 3NT over 2S, which still looks more sensible to me than going straight to 3NT.

Rainer Herrmann
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Memphis MOJOAugust 30, 2010 at 12:06 PM
So, how did some pairs make it? I guess they must have had a different auction which causes a different defense.
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About This Blog

First, a word or two about who am I so you have some idea how seriously to take the advice you find here. I retired from tournament bridge in 1992 (coincidentally, the year my daughter was born). At the time, I had accumulated a little over 5000 masterpoints. I had won numerous regional events and had finished second or third in several national events. Annoyingly, I have never won a national event of any significance. (The qualification is necessary. I did win one national event of little significance.) My best result was second place in the Grand National Teams (with John Lowenthal, Michael Becker, Ron Rubin, Michael Rosenberg, and Brian Glubok). I have theories about why this is, but I won't bore you with them now.

I am still in contact with many of my friends from tournament days. So I still discuss bridge and, occasionally, still write articles for Bridge World magazine, some of which you can find reprinted here: Phillip Martin's Bridge Articles

I have always enjoyed writing about bridge and have, from time to time, considered starting a blog. I think there is a void in the bridge literature that I can make some attempt to fill. Bob Hamman has stated that most people play bridge by asking themselves what they should do. Instead, they should be asking themselves what is going on. Once you figure that out, what to do will often suggest itself. I think he is right about that, and I think bridge literature is partly responsible. Bridge books and articles focus on the unusual and the spectacular. They can get you in the habit of looking for opportunities to shine, which isn’t what you should be thinking about.

The late John Lowenthal, my partner for years, was perhaps the king of doing the unusual, especially on defense. But he always found these plays by being alert to what was going on, not by simply looking for opportunities to do something unexpected. If declarer spurned a finesse John expected him to take or failed to attack a suit that John expected him to attack, John would ask himself why. Frequently, the answer to this question would reveal the entire deal. Then John could be creative and think about finding some way to deflect declarer from the winning line. And, often, he succeeded.

What I am going to attempt to do in this blog is to show by example how one should think about the game. The focus will be on process, not on results. How do you figure out what is going on? How do you try to conceal what’s going on to the opponents? How do you try to clarify the position to partner? These are the skills that separate the expert from the intermediate player more than the ability to execute a backwash squeeze. And, for this purpose, almost any deal can provide material for discussion.

What I propose to do is to play in BBO robot individuals and report on each deal in detail, focusing on the questions I ask myself and how I reach each decision. I will report on each deal, not just the ones I find interesting or instructive. This blog will probably not be of much help to a beginner, but I think it will be instructive for an intermediate player. And my expert friends will finally see what is going on inside my head when I’m in one of my interminable huddles.

I will be South, but, following convention, I will always make South declarer in the diagrams. Thus my reported compass direction may change from deal to deal.

I should point out that not all of my ideas are mainstream. I considered including a catalog of quirks, but I decided that was unnecessary. They will become apparent in due time.

The Gargoyle Chronicles

Sunday, August 29, 2010

Match 2 - Board 18

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