BBO Daylong Tournament 1 - Apr 7, 2021 - Board 1

It's been a while, but I"m going to try my hand at this blog again. 

Robot bridge has changed considerably in the nine years since I stopped posting. You can now compete with other players in individual tournaments, where your partner and opponents are robots. I'll be doing just that, playing in an eight-board BBO "best-hand" tournament with matchpoint scoring. ("Best-hand" means you are dealt the hand with the greatest or equal-greatest number of high-card points, not necessarily the best hand.)

Each week, I will post a new deal, which will be available Monday morning.

Board 1
Neither vulnerable

♠ 10 5 ♥ A J 7 ♦ K Q J 2 ♣ A J 10 6

Partner opens one club and RHO passes. The bots play strong jump shifts at the two level. Two diamonds could be right, since if I don't show my strength right away, it may be hard to do so later. But it could be hard to find a rebid. Say partner bids three diamonds. Now what? Three hearts would show a stiff heart and club support. So I have to bid either three notrump with no spade stopper or four clubs, propelling us past three notrump. Perhaps it's better to bid a straight-forward two clubs, showing a limit raise or better.

I bid two clubs and partner bids two spades. If I had known he was going to do that, I would have responded two diamonds. Two notrump now would describe my hand nicely. As it is, I have no good bid. Two notrump isn't forcing, and my hand is over strength for three notrump. I could temporize with three diamonds, but I'm not sure what that will accomplish. If I were willing to raise three notrump to four, there might a point to bidding three diamonds. But my hand isn't worth that, so three diamonds simply makes the auction complicated for no reason. In addition, it risks something awkward like a four club bid from partner. Underbidding slightly with three notrump looks best. I bid three notrump and everyone passes.

	NORTH Robot ♠ A K 7 ♥ 10 3 2 ♦ 9 8 ♣ K Q 8 5 2
	SOUTH Phillip ♠ 10 5 ♥ A J 7 ♦ K Q J 2 ♣ A J 10 6

West	North	East	South
Robot	Robot	Robot	Phillip
	1 ♣	Pass	2 ♣
Pass	2 ♠	Pass	3 NT
(All Pass)

West leads the three of spades. If I win in dummy and drive the diamond ace, I have ten tricks. What are my chances for doing better? One possibility is to duck the spade, hoping the lead was from queen-jack. If that loses, however, East will probably shift to a heart, and my chances of taking eleven tricks will vanish. Rather than take a 25% chance, I'm better off winning the lead in dummy and floating the diamond nine. That gives me a 50% chance at an extra trick. The problem with that line is I risk going down if the finesse loses. This was an awkward hand to bid, and some tables may get too high; so I don't want to risk going minus. I still think winning the spade offers better chances than ducking. If the diamond ace is onside, East may hop on the first or second round. And if he doesn't, I have a chance to work on a developing a heart trick.

I rise with the space ace, and East plays the queen. It's nice to know ducking would not have worked. The spade deuce is still missing. I follow with the spade five and lead the diamond nine from dummy--three--queen--five. Both opponents played low. The bots sometimes give count when following suit, but they don't do so consistently, so you can't rely on it. (Strangely, their first discard in a suit is count rather than attitude, and that signal is almost always honest.) If East's three happens to be an honest count card, then West has an even number, so his five may be the start of an echo. 

The queen, incidentally, was the right diamond to play. If West has the ace and you play the king, he can pretty sure you have the queen, since this would be an unlikely trick-two play otherwise, and he might duck. But if you play the queen, he will worry that his partner has the king and might be afraid to duck. The jack is the worst option of the three. It leaks too much information. Of course none of this matters against bots, since they don't draw inferences from your play. But it's still good practice.

I cash the club ace--three, deuce, four, then lead the club jack to dummy's king. West plays the seven; East, the nine. I play the diamond eight from dummy and East follows with the seven. The jack would be an error on this round also, since it would mark me with the king. So I play the king. West follows with the ten. It's possible he began with ten doubleton. But it's also possible he holds the six and is playing randomly from equals. One thing I don't think is possible is that East began with ace third. The bots play as if you can see their hands, so they often see no gain in ducking with ace doubleton. If East had ace doubleton remaining, he would probably hop to avoid losing the tempo. That means diamonds were initially either two-five or three-four. In the latter case, West would have begun with 1065 and East with A743, playing three, then seven on the two diamond plays. Against a human that's an unlikely sequence of plays, but against bots it's quite possible. As I said, they don't necessarily give accurate count when following suit, (Note no one gave club count.) and playing high spots gratuitously after the first play in a suit is something they like to do.

I play the club six to dummy's eight, retaining flexibility in the club suit. West discards the nine of hearts; East, the five. Again, their discards are almost always honest count. So it appears West has four hearts and East has three. East would not have given me a heart trick by pitching from honor third, so West presumably began with KQ94. This is the current position:

	NORTH Robot ♠ K 7 ♥ 10 3 2 ♦ -- ♣ Q 5
	SOUTH Phillip ♠ 10 ♥ A J 7 ♦ J 2 ♣ 10

I still don't know where the spade deuce is, and the spade three is consistent with either a four- or five-card spade suit; so West began with either 5-4-2-2 or 4-4-3-2. If I cash the remaining clubs, West must come down to five cards. He will hold two spades and KQ4 of hearts. If his spades were high, I could cash the spade ace and endplay him. But East has the spade jack (given his trick one play), so that isn't going to work. I don't appear to have much of a chance of finding an eleventh trick.

I cash the club queen. East discards the heart eight (presumably from eight-six), and West discards the spade six. Still no deuce in sight. On the last club, East discards the diamond six; West, the spade nine. The spade deuce is still out, but the diamond six is revealing. If West didn't hold the six, his diamond ten was likely an honest card. That means he was 5-4-2-2. He is left with two small spades and KQ4 of hearts. East is left with Jx of spades, the heart six, and A4 of diamonds. It doesn't appear there is anything I can do except hope that my construction is wrong. Perhaps East did start with honor third of hearts and has pitched down to a stiff honor? It's not likely, but it's the only thing I can think of to hope for. I play the heart deuce; East follows with the six. Oh, well. I see nothing to gain by taking my ace. I play the jack. West wins with the queen and returns the four.

What! What's going on? West for some reason thinks I'm down to a stiff ace and he has something to gain by driving it? I play low from dummy and win with the seven as East discards the diamond four. The heart ace squeezes East in spades and diamonds. He throws the diamond ace, so I make six.

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

See what I mean about the bots' playing high spots gratuitously? West, with 9642 of spades remaining, discarded the six, then the nine, isolating the spade guard in his partner's hand.

I lost concentration at the end. I should have played the heart ten when West exited with a heart. If my construction was correct it wouldn't matter. But if East somehow held the heart king, it would. I have to win the second heart in my hand for the squeeze to operate. Forgetting to cater to cases where my construction is wrong and catering doesn't cost is a mistake I make more often than I should. That's especially true if I have just spent a fair amount of time working through possibilities, as I did here, and exhausted myself.

This result was worth 95.5% of the matchpoints. While the defense was uninspired, everyone is playing against the same opponents, so one might expect this result to be duplicated at some other tables. It wasn't. Those who played three notrump from the South side all deviated from my play before reaching this end position. Two pairs did manage to make six. But they played from the North side, and the defense began with the lead of the spade eight from QJ8.

A fair number of players responded one diamond, thereby reaching three notrump from the other side. One diamond certainly works well when partner rebids one notrump, since you can raise to three without fear of missing anything. But other auctions could prove awkward. I like getting my club support into the auction without taking three rounds of bidding to do it. If partner splinters over two clubs, for example, I will be better placed than those who started with one diamond.

One player did bid two clubs, followed by three diamonds over the two spade rebid, as I considered briefly. This led to the result I feared. North should have punted with three hearts, but he bid four clubs. Now there was no way to recover. They finished in six clubs down two. Temporizing because you have extras is fine if you have a plan. But often it is just a feel-good action. It feels good to bid something other than three notrump, because your hand is too good for three notrump. But if it doesn't accomplish anything as a practical matter, what's the point?

The critical play was the heart jack. I had given up. It appeared there was no chance to take another trick, and it made no difference what I did. So I might just as well have played the heart ace. Fortunately I didn't, but it is was more instinct than a conscious decision. When all appears lost, ducking a trick is often a better idea than winning it. It's easier for an opponent to do something foolish if you put him on play.