Board 27
Neither vulnerable
Neither vulnerable
| ♠ 7 4 3 ♥ K 9 7 ♦ K 9 8 4 ♣ K 10 4 |
I pass in first seat. LHO opens with one spade, and RHO bids two diamonds. I pass. LHO rebids two spades, and RHO raises to four. Partner leads the deuce of hearts (third and lowest).
| NORTH ♠ A J 9 ♥ Q 4 ♦ A Q J 7 5 2 ♣ J 5 | ||
| EAST ♠ 7 4 3 ♥ K 9 7 ♦ K 9 8 4 ♣ K 10 4 |
| West | North | East | South |
| Pass | 1 ♠ | ||
| Pass | 2 ♦ | Pass | 2 ♠1 |
| Pass | 4 ♠ | (All pass) | |
| 1Forcing | |||
The first thing I do when dummy hits is to take note of and memorize the outstanding diamond spots: the three, six, and ten. I once complimented a player for his table presence. Whenever he held a suit like this and played low to the queen, winning the trick, he always seemed to know without any doubt whether the king was onside or whether his RHO had ducked. "That's easy," he told me. "The guy who has the king is the one who glances at dummy's spot cards after his partner plays."
Declarer plays low from dummy. That's a revealing play. If declarer has ace-jack third of hearts, he would normally play the queen as a discovery play. It gains to play low only if I have a singleton king (which seems unlikely) or if declarer needs to win the first trick in his hand (which does not seem to be the case here). The advantages of playing the queen are: (1) declarer finds out where the king is, which will help him in constructing the defenders' hands, and (2) it conceals the location of the jack from both opponents. So I assume declarer has ace-ten third of hearts.
If I'm right about that, then partner probably has the club ace. Leading from the jack is not particulary attractive, and there is no instrinsic reason from the auction that partner should lead a heart rather than a club. The likeliest reason for choosing a heart over a club is that he has the club ace.
If I'm right that partner has the club ace, then I can draw the further conclusion that declarer probably does not have a doubleton club. With ace-ten third of hearts and two small clubs (or queen doubleton), declarer would want to guess whether partner has led from the jack or from the king and play accordingly. Since defenders are more likely to lead from a king than from a jack, the queen is the normal guess. With ace-ten third of hearts and three small clubs (or queen third), however, it would be logical to play low to ensure taking a second heart trick. Declarer doesn't have the tempi to ruff both the third round of hearts and the third round of clubs. So guessing hearts doesn't gain anything. Declarer would be unlikely to go down in this contract if he plays low at trick one. He might well go down if he plays the queen and it gets covered.
I play the nine, and declarer wins with the jack. Poof! The entire chain of conclusions I reached above has now gone up in smoke. Playing low from dummy with ace-jack third in your hand is such an unusual play that, opposite some partners, I would be virtually certain that partner had underled the heart ace. In this case, however, I will just assume that Jack doesn't appreciate the value of information. On purely technical grounds, low is the correct play, so Jack chose it.
Declarer plays the deuce of spades--six--jack. I play the four. Offhand, this play doesn't appear to make any sense. If declarer intends to take ruffs in dummy, he shouldn't be playing trumps. And if he intends to establish diamonds, he shouldn't be wasting dummy entries.
Declarer leads the queen of hearts. I can't imagine he's going to let this ride, so I play low. If declarer didn't want to make a discovery play at trick one, I'm not going to help him out now. Declarer plays the ace, and partner follows with the three. Now declarer attacks diamonds: six--three--ace. I guess partner wasn't sure he could afford the ten. I've seen him give away tricks in the past with his count signals. I'm not sure why he's being more careful this time, but I'm happy to see it. I play the four and follow with the eight when declarer leads a low diamond from dummy.
Declarer ruffs with the five of spades, then plays the eight of spades to dummy's nine as partner pitches the five of hearts. Two mistakes in a row. With king-queen-ten-eight-five of spades, there is no reason not to ruff the diamonds high (with at least the ten). He should then led the five of spades to the ace, not the nine. Even if he can't imagine why he would want to win the third round of spades in his hand, what does it hurt to keep his options open? Sometimes the reason doesn't occur to you until later, for example, a half a second after you call for the nine.
Declarer leads the queen of diamonds from dummy. I play the nine, and declarer ruffs. With diamonds not breaking, all declarer can do now is ruff a heart in the dummy and lose three club tricks. Making four.
| NORTH ♠ A J 9 ♥ Q 4 ♦ A Q J 7 5 2 ♣ J 5 | ||
| WEST ♠ 6 ♥ 10 8 5 3 2 ♦ 10 3 ♣ A 9 7 6 3 | EAST ♠ 7 4 3 ♥ K 9 7 ♦ K 9 8 4 ♣ K 10 4 | |
| SOUTH ♠ K Q 10 8 5 2 ♥ A J 6 ♦ 6 ♣ Q 8 2 |
As I thought, leading a spade to dummy at trick two was an error. If declarer had started diamonds right away, he would have had enough dummy entries to make five. You might think that making five would be the normal result, but no one acheived that. One pair made six. Everyone else made four. Presumably the declarer who made six chose to take a ruffing finesse against the king of diamonds. Perhaps his West got into the auction and tipped off his two-suiter.
Score on Board 27: -420 (7 MP)
Total: 214 MP (66.0%)
Current rank: 1st
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