Event 3 - Match 4 - Board 2

Board 2
Our side vulnerable

♠ 7 6 ♥ A K J 9 8 ♦ A K 2 ♣ Q J 8

Pass to me. I open one heart, and partner responds one spade. I bid two notrump (18-19 HCP). Partner raises to three, and LHO leads the club ace.

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

West	North	East	South
Harry	Jack	William	Phillip
		Pass	1 ♥
Pass	1 ♠	Pass	2 NT
Pass	3 NT	(All pass)

East plays the five of clubs, and I follow with the eight. West continues with the club king, and East plays the seven. One usually leads low from ace-king fourth. So my guess is West led from ace-king third, trying to hit his partner's suit. But then why did he continue clubs after his partner played low?

I drop the club queen (the card I'm known to hold). West continues with the nine of clubs. West must have the deuce of clubs, so it appears I was wrong about the club split. He does have four. I win in my hand as East pitches the deuce of hearts.

I've made four. If I can sneak a spade through, I'll make five. I play the spade six--deuce--queen--eight. Aha! Making five.

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

East had the spade ace and ducked? Interesting. My counterpart made only four, so we pick up an imp.

Which club should West lead? An honor could be necessary in a layout such as

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

But, on the auction, dummy can't sensibly have a singleton club. So presumably West led the ace to cater to declarer or dummy holding a doubleton queen.

A low club is better in two scenarios: (1) It avoids blocking the suit in a layout such as

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

And (2) it retains communication if you must concede a club to establish your long trick:

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

So either high or low could be right. Which is better? It's hard to say. But there is an additional consideration. We need five tricks to beat this. If we take that fact into account, you probably don't need to lead a club at all.

You may need to lead a club if  partner has five of them. But, given dummy rates to have seven minor-suit cards, that seems unlikely. If we can take only four club tricks, partner needs a side entry, so running clubs can wait. In scenario (2), where we are after only three clubs tricks, partner needs two tricks on the side. He can use the first entry to lead a club, which you will duck, and the second entry to run the suit.

Since a club lead probably isn't necessary double dummy, why guess whether to lead a high club or a low club? If you guess wrong, you could be making the only lead that allows declarer to make his contract. So why not just lead a passive eight of diamonds?

One might raise a couple of objections to this line of reasoning. One objection is suggested by the use of the words "double dummy" in the previous paragraph. Partner might not find the club shift when he gets in. An initial club lead will certainly make things easier for him. A second objection is that the diamond lead may pickle our fifth trick. The right defense might be to cash four clubs, then wait for declarer to misguess diamonds.

As for the first objection, I'm hoping my failure to lead a club will clue partner in that I think the suit may be running off the top. Even if that message doesn't come across, it may be hard for him to construct a layout where we can take five tricks that doesn't involve running the club suit. As for the second objection, I suspect we will have a hard time beating this anyway if partner's only side trick is a slow trick in diamonds. I probably need him to have either an entry in one of the majors or the diamond ace to prevent declarer from having nine cashing tricks.

What about East's duck of the spade ace? Does that play make any sense? East knows I have all the missing high cards, including the heart jack. The only hand I can think of where I have a loser other than the spade ace is,

♠ x x ♥ A K J x ♦ A K x x ♣ Q J x.

But what does ducking accomplish? It's not as if I'm going to come to my hand and play a second spade. Instead, I'll just run my tricks and hope for a spade-diamond squeeze, which East knows is going to work. In other words, rather than duck the spade ace, East should have simply pitched the ace on the third round of clubs. He would let me make five a lot faster that way.

I'd say neither opponent was thinking very clearly on this deal. That's the way I like it. Next board, please. Before they have a chance to grab a cup of coffee.

Table 1: +660
Table 2: -630

Result on Board 2: +1 imp
Total: -7 imps

Event 3 - Match 4 - Board 1

Board 1
Neither vulnerable

♠ 9 8 6 2 ♥ 9 5 4 2 ♦ K 9 7 6 2 ♣ --

Partner opens one spade, and RHO overcalls two clubs. I wish I could bid three spades, but partner insists on playing that as a limit raise rather than as pre-emptive. Four spades seems a bit much with eight losers. so I settle for two spades. LHO bids five clubs, and everyone passes.

If partner has the spade ace, the trick probably isn't going away. And cashing it now may simply set up discards in dummy. As I've said before, it can be dangerous to lead a nine-card fit when you are missing the middle honors. Diamonds looks like a better choice. If my king of diamonds is not working on defense, we probably aren't beating this, so why not hope it is working and act accordingly?

Since I have an entryless hand, I have to consider leading the king to try to retain the lead, but I don't have to consider it very long. It's hard to see why I need to be on lead at trick two. And if partner has the diamond queen rather than the ace, I surely want to lead low, since we don't want partner to have the sole guard in every suit. Accordingly, I lead the diamond deuce.

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

West	North	East	South
Phillip	Harry	Jack	William
		1 ♠	2 ♣
2 ♠	5 ♣	(All pass)

I don't think we have much chance of beating this. Partner wins the diamond ace; declarer drops the three. Partner returns the diamond eight, and declarer plays the five. The eight cannot be partner's highest card, since declarer would have covered. The only holding consistent with the eight is ace-queen-ten-eight, giving declarer jack-five-three. So declarer's shape seems to be 0-4-3-6 or 0-3-3-7. None of our tricks can go away. Either partner has the heart king or he doesn't. Either he has a trump trick or he doesn't. I can go back to sleep now.

Declarer ruffs in dummy, draws two rounds of trumps, and claims. Making six.

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

How about that? I made the right lead for a change. I stopped the second overtrick.

Since the opponents have a wasted ace - not to mention a wasted queen and two wasted jacks - it seems they should have come a little closer to reaching slam. Obviously three spades by North is a better start than five clubs. But would that work? South has two features to show: his second suit and his spade void. He must decide which is more important. If he bids four hearts, North will bid a slam. If he bids four spades, North probably won't. Or if he does, it's just a lucky decision. He would also be reaching slam opposite the same hand with the red suits reversed.

Our teammates did not reach slam either, though they apparently received more aggressive interference than we gave our opponents. They wound up defending five spades doubled and dropped a trick, beating it only one. We lose eight imps.

How did they drop a trick? I can't say for sure, but I can guess. Suppose the defense starts with a club, ruffed low in dummy. Dummy now leads the spade six. North, thinking declarer is psychic and is about to let the six ride, covers with the seven. Declarer wins with jack, discovering the bad break. He ruffs another club and leads dummy's last spade, the nine. North ducks, and declarer lets the nine hold. To get to his hand to continue trumps, declarer must play a diamond. Then, when he leads a trump to North's ace, North can recover his trump trick by taking a diamond ruff. He plays ace, queen of hearts, expecting South to overtake and give him his ruff. But will he? South must decide whether to overtake and play a diamond or to duck, playing declarer for

♠ K Q J x x x ♥ J x x ♦ A 10 ♣ x x

Or perhaps even to overtake and play a heart, playing declarer for

♠ K Q J x x ♥ J x x ♦ A Q 10 ♣ x x

It does seem there are clues enabling him to get this right. But apparently he didn't. Can North help him out? If South has managed to signal possession of he heart king, North might try the effect of leading jack, queen of hearts. Once South knows for sure declarer has a doubleton heart, he has no reason not to overtake and play a diamond.

Why jack, queen rather than queen, jack? In this deal, it doesn't matter. Partner should do the right thing however you card. But you should still play jack, queen just to reassure partner for the sake of future deals that you know how to signal.

As a general rule, playing your cards in a non-standard order is an alarm clock, waking partner up to the fact that something unusual is going on, frequently that you are ruffing something. If there were any ambiguity, your decision to employ or not to employ an alarm clock is how you would resolve that ambiguity.

For example, take this layout:

	NORTH ♥ x x x
WEST ♥ x x x		EAST ♥ A Q J x
	SOUTH ♥ K x x

You want to take three heart tricks, then lead a fourth round for a trump promotion. So you lead queen, jack, hoping declarer misplaces the ace and ducks twice, trying to block the suit. If you are wrong about the location of the king and partner has it, no harm done. At least no harm done unless partner decides you are trying to put him on play for a ruff and overtakes the jack. He knows not to do that, however, if he can be confident you would play jack, queen as an alarm clock if that is what you wanted.

Table 1: -420
Table 2: +100

Result on Board 1: -8 imps
Total: -8 imps

Event 3 - Match 3 - Board 8

Board 8
Neither vulnerable

♠ A 5 ♥ K J 9 4 ♦ 6 4 ♣ Q 8 7 5 2

LHO opens one club, alerted as showing "at least a doubleton." Of course, that doesn't mean it could be a doubleton, but I'll assume that's what RHO meant to say.

Partner overcalls one heart, and RHO bids one spade. I could cue-bid to show a limit raise or better. But why be so delicate? Are we really going to buy this in three hearts? The opponents have the master suit, and this is probably their hand. Sometimes when you hold the heart suit it's better to overbid slightly and force the opponents to guess what to do. This is particularly true if you can't tell from your own hand what you want them to do. If you don't know whether they should bid four spades or not, why should they know?

I bid four hearts (showing at least a doubleton). LHO bids four spades; partner bids five hearts. Not to be outdone, RHO bids five spades. Since I have more defense than I might have for my four heart bid, it's tempting to double to make sure partner doesn't bid again. But that isn't necessary opposite a disciplined partner. If partner were contemplating bidding again, he should have involved me by bidding five of a minor. We don't rate to beat this two tricks. So there is little reason to double except to stop partner from doing something he shouldn't do anyway. Accordingly, I pass. Five spades ends the auction.

I don't see any need for partner to be on play at trick two. On the other hand, it might easily be necesssary for me to switch to a diamond at trick two. So I lead the heart king.

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

West	North	East	South
Phillip	Nathaniel	Jack	Marcus
	1 ♣1	1 ♥	1 ♠
4 ♥	4 ♠	5 ♥	5 ♠
(All pass)
1At least a doubleton

Dummy wins with the ace, and partner plays the heart eight. As I play, a high heart suggests that the obvious shift (diamonds) is a bad idea. I know some would play this card as suit-preference, but that's a serious error in my book. Longtime readers of this blog might want to skip the next three paragraphs, since you've heard it all before. (Unless somehow I still haven't unconvinced you. In which case, please read on.)

Let's call my method of signaling Method A: Discouraging in hearts suggests the obvious shift (in this case, diamonds). Encouraging ostensibly suggests I want hearts continued. But partner must be alert to the fact I have no way to ask for the less obvious shift (in this case, clubs). So he is free to use his judgment and shift to clubs if that seems likelier to be productive than continuing hearts. The more common method of signaling is Method B: If a heart continuation is logical, my card is attitude. Encouraging suggests hearts; discouraging suggests the obvious shift. If a heart continuation is illogical, my card is suit preference.

Note that if a heart continuation is clearly logical or clearly illogical, it makes no difference which method I play. Either method will work. But if one of us thinks a heart shift is logical and the other thinks it isn't, (A) is clearly superior. Playing (A), if I want a diamond shift, I am going to get one, since a low card always suggests diamonds. Playing (B), if there is any confusion, I am guaranteed to get the wrong shift whichever shift I want.

There will always be some hands where it is unclear whether a heart continuation is logical or not, and I don't think you can devise sensible rules to eliminate these ambiguities. Even a rule like "a heart continuation is illogical if dummy has a singleton heart" (which many people play) is demonstrably wrong. Sometimes you want to continue hearts because you want to defend passively. Sometimes you want to continue hearts to tap dummy's trumps, promoting a trump trick for the defense. Yes, there is point somewhere along the continuum where a heart continuation becomes illogical. But how do you define where that point is? Or, more importantly, why bother to define where that point is? What do you gain by switching from attitude to suit preference? How can it possibly be right to play "high" for diamonds in some cases and "low" for diamonds in other cases based on some subjective criterion about which you and your partner might disagree? Sometimes one must make tradeoffs in choosing one method over another, and different people may evaluate the tradeoffs differently. But here I see no tradeoff. I don't see that (B) offers any advantage over (A).

Jack, of course, plays neither (A) nor (B). He plays (J). He is simply showing the heart queen with his signal. Thanks, Jack.

Declarer plays a low club from dummy, partner plays the king, and declarer ruffs with the four of spades. Why is declarer ruffing clubs to his hand? It looks as if he's missing king-jack of diamonds and is trying to strip the hand for an endplay. I play the club deuce.

Declarer ruffs the deuce of hearts in dummy. I play the four; partner, the six. I haven't seen the three yet. Partner should be giving count, but Jack tends to play up the line in these situations. So the three is probably in declarer's hand. That gives partner a 1-5-4-3 or 0-5-5-3 pattern. (I refuse to believe he bid five hearts with 2-5-3-3.)

Declarer ruffs a club with the six of spades. Partner plays the nine; I play the five. Declarer leads the elusive three of hearts--nine--spade three--heart seven. He then ruffs out partner's club ace with the spade seven.

We are down to this position:

	NORTH Jack ♠ J 8 ♥ -- ♦ A Q 7 ♣ J 10
WEST Phillip ♠ A 5 ♥ J ♦ 6 4 ♣ Q 8

We need to score two diamond tricks to beat this. If partner is 0-5-5-3 (making declarer 7-3-3-0), what are our prospects? Declarer will lead a trump. If I win and play a diamond, declarer can simply duck and partner is endplayed. To stop the endplay, I must win and play a trump. But then declarer doesn't need an endplay. He can concede a trick to my club queen, then pitch his last diamond on dummy's good club. I can't beat this if declarer is 7-3-3-0.

What if partner is 1-5-4-3 (making declarer 6-3-4-0)? Declarer leads a trump. Now if I win and play a trump, declarer is a trick short. Do I need to win it? Can I afford to duck in case partner has a stiff king of spades and no jack of diamonds? If I duck and partner follows low, declarer can abandon trumps and duck a diamond to partner. A diamond return into dummy's ace-queen is obviously fatal. If, instead, partner returns a heart, declarer pitches a diamond, ruffing in dummy. Declarer is now down to two trumps and two diamonds, and I am down to the spade ace, one diamond, and two clubs. Since I have two clubs, I can't stop declarer from scoring both his trumps. He ruffs a club, plays a diamond to the ace, and ruffs another club. I end up ruffing partner's diamond winner with my spade ace at trick thirteen. So I can't afford to cater to a stiff spade king in partner's hand. Not that I'm too worried about it given the auction.

Declarer leads the spade queen. I take the ace as planned, and partner follows with the ten. I play a trump. Declarer wins in dummy, and partner plays the diamond eight. Declarer now leads the ten of clubs. Partner pitches the heart ten, and declarer pitches the diamond deuce. I win with the queen and exit with a heart, which declarer ruffs. Declarer is left with three small diamonds in his hand. Dummy has ace-queen of diamonds and a good club. Declarer takes a losing diamond finesse and is down one.

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

Declarer was out of trumps. The only reason he could afford the diamond finesse was partner was out of hearts. Partner erred by pitching a heart on the ten of clubs. Had he pitched a diamond instead, we would beat this two if declarer tried to make it by finessing the diamond in the end position. Of course, it would be pretty foolish of declarer to do that. If I had the diamond king, I wouldn't be putting him in his hand. Upon winning the club queen, I would just return a club and lock him in dummy. But it can't hurt to give declarer a chance to be foolish.

I suppose I shouldn't complain about partner too much. He did bid five hearts, after all. I doubt very much I would have done that. I don't expect to make it, and declarer doesn't have a source of tricks in a minor, so it seems unlikely four spades is making. Accordingly, I would pass. That is such a poor decision in practice that I wonder if I'm missing something. Why is Jack's judgment better than mine? I presented this hand in a bridgewinners.com poll to see if anyone had any insights. Over 80% of the respondents chose to defend. So either Jack knows something we humans don't or he was just lucky.

This board is yet another push, the fourth one of this match. We win the match by two imps and pick up a mere 16 out of 30 victory points. I was certainly right not risk a double. The extra two imps would have picked up no victory points, so the risk-reward ratio was infinite. Fortunately, 16 victory points is enough to stay in the lead.


Table 1: +50
Table 2: -50

Result on Board 7: 0 imps

Result on Match 3: +2 imps (16 VP)
Current Total: 58 VP

For our next match, we play William and Harry, another Majeure cinquieme pair. I didn't even know William and Harry played bridge, although I know their mother was a big fan of the game.

Event 3 - Match 3 - Board 7

Board 7
Both sides vulnerable

♠ Q 9 6 3 ♥ J 8 6 ♦ 3 ♣ A K 10 8 3

I pass in first seat. Partner opens three diamonds in third seat and buys it. RHO leads the deuce of clubs. Their convention card says "low encouraging."

	NORTH Phillip ♠ Q 9 6 3 ♥ J 8 6 ♦ 3 ♣ A K 10 8 3
	SOUTH Jack ♠ J 8 ♥ Q 7 4 3 ♦ A K J 9 8 6 5 ♣ --

West	North	East	South
Marcus	Phillip	Nathanial	Jack
	Pass	Pass	3 ♦
(All pass)

Three diamonds? On a five-loser hand? I hope partner wouldn't have done this in first seat. And I'd just as soon he didn't do it in third seat either. He might make four hearts opposite a psyche.

I rise with the club ace. East plays the seven, and I discard a spade. I cash the club king and discard another spade. East plays the four; West, the five. If "encouraging" means West has an honor, then I suppose the club honors are split.

If I don't have a heart trick, I need to pick up the diamonds. If I do have a heart trick, I need to hold diamonds to one loser. But it doesn't really matter what my objective is. Low to the jack is my best play in either case. Sometimes one spurns a trump finesse to avoid a ruff. But in this case, I welcome a ruff. If the diamond finesse loses and they grab a heart ruff, that establishes the fourth round of hearts for me, and I've made my contract.

I lead the three of diamonds--seven--jack--deuce. I play the diamond king--four--club three--diamond ten. That makes nine tricks. I hope the opponents weren't planning on leading a club against three notrump. I cash the diamond ace, pitching another club from dummy. West pitches the club six. The missing clubs are the queen, jack, and nine. The honors are presumably split, but I don't know who has the nine. East might well have decided it was too important a card to signal with at trick one.

If I can take a heart trick, I'll make four. West probably would have led from ace-king of a major, so East must have at least one honor in each major. In fact, he must have exactly one honor in each major. Otherwise he would have an opening bid. So I know the heart honors are split. If they are three-three or if I can duck out a singleton or doubleton honor, I will make a heart trick.

I have two ways to duck out an honor: (A) I can play low to the jack, then lead low from my hand. Or (B) I can lead the queen from my hand. If West wins this, I lead toward the dummy and duck. (A) works if West has shortness, and (B) works if East does. Does either play offer any extra chances? Yes. (B) allows me to pick up honor-ten or honor-nine doubleton on my left. My queen forces West's honor. Then, when I lead toward dummy's jack and see the ten or nine appear, I can cover, eventually establishing my seven. So (B) is a standout, especially when you consider that East is more likely than West to have short hearts anyway.

I lead the queen of hearts--deuce---six--ace. I ruff the return and lead a heart to the jack. Making four.

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

I wonder why West ducked the heart queen. Couldn't I have been three-three in the majors?

I don't care for the opening lead. I would have led the spade king. Leading long, weak suits against pre-empts frequently seems to accomplish nothing other than to allow declarer to take quick discards. If you lead a short suit and catch dummy with values there, at least declarer rates to have some length in that suit, so he doesn't have any quick pitches. Make dummy's club ace the spade ace, for example, and the spade lead doesn't hurt. As the cards lie, a spade lead beats three diamonds a trick. That's not as good as a heart lead, which beats it two tricks. But it's better than letting them make it.

I commented above that East is more likely than West to have short hearts. Why is that? West is known to have four or five clubs and a doubleton diamond, and I will assume hearts are not three-three (else my decision is irrelevant). If West has five clubs, then he is either 4-2-2-5 or 2-4-2-5. But if has four clubs, he is almost surely 3-4-2-4. 5-2-2-4 is contraindicated both by his failure to pitch a spade on the third diamond and by his choice of opening leads. If he chose to lead a long suit, his five-card suit would be a more natural choice.

The other table played three diamonds making three, so we pick up an imp. They probably got a club lead as well but misplayed the hearts even worse than I did. I turns out (A) and (B) were both wrong. Assuming I'm right about the split honors, I had a 100% line available: play low from both hands, ruff the return, and play low from both hands again.

Now I have to ask myself why I didn't think of that. I suppose it's because my first thought was that I had to guess who had the doubleton. Once I found a play that improved on that, I was happy. Deciding when it's OK to stop thinking is one of the hardest problems in bridge. I"m sure if I were to encounter this as a problem in a book ("Find a sure trick line for an overtrick, assuming split honors."), I would solve it. But at the table, no one tells you there is a sure trick line. If you don't see one right away, how do you know whether to keep looking or not? I confess I have no idea of how to avoid errors like this.

Table 1: +130
Table 2: -110

Result on Board 7: 1 imps
Total: +2 imps

Event 3 - Match 3 - Board 6

Board 6
Opponents vulnerable

♠ J 8 7 6 5 ♥ 10 2 ♦ K Q J 6 ♣ A 8

One pass to me. I open one spade, partner raises to three spades, and I pass. LHO leads the king of hearts.

	NORTH Jack ♠ Q 10 9 2 ♥ A 9 8 4 ♦ 7 5 ♣ Q 7 6
	SOUTH Phillip ♠ J 8 7 6 5 ♥ 10 2 ♦ K Q J 6 ♣ A 8

West	North	East	South
Nathanial	Jack	Marcus	Phillip
		Pass	1 ♠
Pass	3 ♠	(All pass)

I wouldn't make a limit raise with this hand myself. But if partner wants to, I'll take that as a compliment.

I have five losers: a heart, a diamond, a club, and two trump tricks. The only loser I have any realistic chance to avoid is the club. I might be able to establish a heart to pitch my club loser on. (Among other possibilities: West might have king-queen doubleton.) Since I'm unable to draw trumps quickly, however, it may be difficult to manage that, even if a favorable heart position exists. A more likely prospect is to establish three diamond tricks, allowing me to pitch club losers from dummy. Say I lead a diamond to the queen and it holds. I now lead trumps, hoping the opponents fail to find a club shift. (Perhaps West has the jack, which would make a club shift unattractive.) Eventually, I reach dummy with the third round of trumps and lead another diamond. East must duck to avoid giving me three diamond tricks. I now need to guess the clubs (which should be easy once I know how the spade honors are split). If West has the king, I play ace and a club. If East has it, I ruff a diamond with dummy's last trump. If the ace doesn't drop, I ruff a heart to my hand and cash my last trump, squeezing East down to a three-card end position. I can then toss him in with the diamond ace.

I might as well start by ducking the heart. As usual, it is better to let West use his entry now before he knows much about the hand. I play the four of hearts from dummy, East plays the three, and I play the deuce.

East didn't encourage. If he has the jack, it must be jack doubleton. West continues with the five of hearts. It's possible he has king-queen-jack. On the given layout, he could afford to lead the queen from that holding. But if I had two slow losers (say, ace third of clubs), leading the queen might enable me to take my ace and concede a heart, establishing my nine for a pitch. He might decide it's better to lead a low heart, hoping his partner has the ten or hoping I have something better to play for than to duck this to my ten at trick two. If that's what's happened, he got what he hoped for. I'm not desperate enough to duck this trick. I rise with the heart ace. East plays the jack.

I play the five of diamonds--deuce--queen--ace. Not good. West shifts to the ten of clubs. I play the queen, East covers with the king, and I win with the ace. This isn't going the way I planned. I've reached this position. I can afford to lose only two more tricks:

	NORTH Jack ♠ Q 10 9 2 ♥ 9 8 ♦ 7 ♣ 7 6
	SOUTH Phillip ♠ J 8 7 6 5 ♥ -- ♦ K J 6 ♣ 8

Do I have any chances left? The only chance I see is to crash trump honors. Perhaps I can get East to ruff a heart with ace doubleton of trumps, then get West to hop with king doubleton when I lead a trump toward dummy. I doubt very much this will work. But it's better than just giving up.

I cash the diamond king and ruff a diamond with the spade nine. West plays eight, ten; East plays three, four. I lead the eight of hearts. East pitches the three of clubs. I didn't think he was going to ruff. Maybe if I have a heart winner in dummy, he'll ruff that. I pitch my club, allowing West to win with his heart queen, establishing dummy's nine.

West exits with the nine of clubs--six--four. I ruff with the five of spades and lead the diamond jack. West pitches the six of hearts, and I ruff in dummy with the deuce. East knows I have no loser left to pitch on the nine of hearts. so I can't imagine he'll ruff. But what else can I do? I lead the nine of hearts. East ruffs with the three of spades! Yay! One opponent down. One to go.

I overruff with the five and lead the spade six. West plays low. Oh, well. They score their two spade tricks for down one.

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

West knows he needs two trump tricks to beat this. So hopping would make no sense. But then, East's ruff made no sense, and that didn't stop him. It's too bad this didn't work. It would be fun watching the opponents argue about who made the worse play.

Howard Chandross was the master at getting the opponents to ruff when they knew--or should have known--he was trump tight. He even had a name for the play: the Idiot's Delight. I saw him execute it many times when he was short of entries for a trump coup. This is the first time I've seen an Idiot's Delight and an Idiot's Coup in combination.

If they raise only to two spades at the other table, they may buy it. So I'm a little a nervous before we compare. But, once again, the board turns out to be a push.


Table 1: -50
Table 2: +50

Result on Board 6: 0 imps
Total: +1 imp

Event 3 - Match 3 - Board 5

Board 5
Our side vulnerable

♠ K Q ♥ K 10 8 5 2 ♦ J 7 ♣ A 10 9 4

Two passes to me. I open one heart, LHO bids one spade, and partner doubles. Some claim this double promises at least four-four in the minors. I don't think that's quite true. First of all, you might have a three-card limit raise in hearts. In addition, there are some awkward hands with a three-card minor where a negative double is the only call that makes sense. Take

♠ x x x x ♥ Q x ♦ A x x x ♣ K x x

for example. You could pass with this pattern if your hand were weaker. But this hand is too good to pass. What else can you do but double? If partner bids two clubs, you can continue with two hearts. Since you would bid three hearts with a three-card limit raise, this bid should show precisely a doubleton heart. I would consider this hand is a minimum for the sequence. You might have as much a two notrump rebid without a spade stopper.

RHO redoubles, showing the ace or king of spades. I bid two clubs. LHO and partner pass. RHO balances with two spades. I pass, LHO passes, and partner competes with three clubs. Everyone passes. LHO leads the jack of spades.

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

West	North	East	South
Nathanial	Jack	Marcus	Phillip
	Pass	Pass	1 ♥
1 ♠	Double1	Redouble2	2 ♣
Pass	Pass	2 ♠	Pass
Pass	3 ♣	(All pass)
1Negative double
2Spade ace or spade king

Partner's three club bid makes no sense. We don't necessarily need nine trumps to compete at three level when the opponents are at the two level. But, with four spades and a singleton in my primary suit, partner's hand is better for defense and worse for offense than is his typical hand on this auction.

RHO plays the ace, and I drop the queen, the card I'm known to hold. He continues with the four of spades to my king; West plays the deuce.

If I can score seven trump tricks on a crossruff, I'll make this. I need to start by ducking a heart. Clearly I would rather lose the heart trick on my left, so that the presumed trump shift rides around to my hand. I can then ruff a heart, ruff a spade, ruff a heart, ruff a spade, and ruff a heart with the club king. That's seven tricks. I need two more, and I still have the diamond ace and a high trump in my hand.

I may be able to increase my chance of ducking the heart to West if I play a diamond to the ace and a heart toward my hand. But releasing the diamond ace is a bad idea. I establish a winner for the opponents, I give the opponents communication, and I expose myself to a possible overruff. If I took the time, I'm sure I could find a specific layout where playing a diamond to the ace costs the contract, but I'm not going to bother. I'm rejecting it because it's bad strategy (sort of like putting your knight on the edge of the board).

West surely has the heart ace on the auction. Should I exit with the heart king? If I were sure West would play a trump, that would make sense. But what if he doesn't? Often the most effective way to scuttle a crossruff is to avoid leading trumps in order to retain the defense's middle cards. That may be the case here. If West wins the heart ace and plays a diamond, I have no clear route to seven trump tricks. Accordingly, I'd just as soon preserve the option of ruffing out ace third of hearts on my left. Besides, leading the heart ten may suffice to keep East off play. It may be hard for West to duck with ace-queen or even ace-jack.

I lead the heart ten. West plays the three, and East wins with the jack. Probably East has the queen also. I do wish I had the benefit of some table action. In real life, even one as table-presence-challenged as I am would have some clue as to whether that was the case or not. East shifts to the deuce of clubs. I play the ten. If this holds, I can crossruff as described above. If West covers, I will be in dummy, where I don't really want to be. But at least I will have flushed out the club queen, which may make things easier.

West does cover with the queen, and I win with dummy's king. This is the position I've reached, with the lead in dummy:

	NORTH Jack ♠ 9 7 ♥ -- ♦ A 5 4 3 ♣ J 7 5
	SOUTH Phillip ♠ -- ♥ K 8 5 2 ♦ J 7 ♣ A 9 4

Can I still crossruff? If I ruff a spade, ruff heart, ruff a spade, and ruff a heart, I'm stuck in dummy with no way to get to my hand to ruff the third heart. Perhaps if West began with ace third of hearts, I can establish hearts instead. Say I play a trump to my hand, ruff a heart, ruff a spade to my hand, and ruff another heart, dropping the ace. My hearts are now good, and I have one trump left with which to draw the remaining defensive trump. If I were in my hand, I could claim my contract. But, again, I'm stuck in dummy.

I don't usually present Gargoyle Chronicles hands as quizzes. But this is a good problem. If I didn't offer you a chance to test yourself, you would be annoyed with me. Under the assumption that West began with ace third of hearts, how do you play to take seven more tricks?
------

I don't know if this problem is actually difficult or if I just had a blind spot. But it took me longer than I care to admit to find the answer. Finally, it dawned on me that I didn't need to ruff two hearts in dummy. I can afford to lose two more tricks. So now that I've found the trump queen, I can afford to lose a heart trick. Why waste one of dummy's trumps ruffing with it when I desperately need it as an entry to my hand? The solution is to ruff a spade to my hand, then lead a low heart pitching dummy's last spade. If the defense plays another trump, I win in my hand, ruff a heart, hopefully dropping West's ace and establishing my suit. I can then return to my hand with dummy's carefully preserved trump. A red-suit switch by the defense does no better. And a spade switch allows me to ruff in dummy and pitch my diamond loser. See? I knew there was a reason not to release the diamond ace.

I play a spade from dummy. East pitches the nine of hearts. Oops. Time to reassess. That looks like queen-jack-nine of hearts, which gives West ace fourth. Actually that makes more sense than ace third on the auction. Holding four hearts would make West's light overcall more attractive. He probably would have led a singleton diamond (or East might have bid diamonds with six of them). So West is probably 5-4-2-2 or 5-4-3-1. The latter pattern I think I can safely ignore. I doubt I can make this against a bad trump break.

The ace isn't going to ruff out. But that's OK. I just need to make a slight adjustment to my plan. Instead of leading a low heart at this point, I need to lead the king, smothering East's queen and establishing my eight. If East did start with four hearts and has falsecarded with the nine, hearts are now two-two. So leading the king doesn't hurt anything.

I ruff the spade and lead the heart king. West plays the ace, I pitch dummy's last spade as planned, and East plays the heart queen. We have now reached this position, slightly different from the one I was envisioning,  with West on play. (I'm just guessing about the diamond honors. They don't really matter.)

	NORTH Jack ♠ -- ♥ -- ♦ A 5 4 3 ♣ J 7 5
WEST Nathanial ♠ 10 x ♥ 7 6 ♦ K x ♣ x		EAST Marcus ♠ -- ♥ -- ♦ Q x x x x ♣ x x
	SOUTH Phillip ♠ -- ♥ 8 5 2 ♦ J 7 ♣ A 9

West plays the eight of clubs. I win in my hand with the nine, ruff a heart with jack, and play a club to my ace. Making three.

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

In the analysis above, I glossed over what would happen if West played a spade, offering me a ruff-sluff. Would that accomplish anything for the defense? I ruff with dummy's five. If East overuffs, I have no problem. I overruff with the nine, ruff a heart with the jack, and play a trump back to my hand. If East refuses to overruff, I can pitch my diamond loser. I've lost control, so I can no longer establish and run hearts. But I don't need to. I need only five more tricks, so I can revert to a crossruff.

The crossruff works only because West has the club eight. If East had it, refusing to overruff dummy's club five would beat me. What an unusual position! You must refuse to overruff the five, allowing declarer his ruff-sluff, so that you can overruff the seven later. Thanks for overbidding, partner. I had much more fun playing this hand than I would have had collecting an easy down two against two spades.

East did make a serious error in pitching the nine of hearts. It cost nothing double dummy, since I could always make the hand by leading the heart king. But I wasn't intending to do that until he clued me in about the lie of the heart suit.

I don't know how the play went at the other table, but somehow my counterpart managed an overtrick in the same contract, cutting our lead in half.

Table 1: +110
Table 2: -130

Result on Board 5: -1 imp
Total: +1 imp


Post script:

Rainer Herrmann points out, "The plan in the quiz scenario should certainly be to ruff only one heart. But what do you actually accomplish by the artistry of ruffing a spade and ducking a heart first? Simply come to the club nine, ruff a heart and play dummy's last club to the trump ace. Now decide which heart honor is more likely to drop, having seen the heart nine from West, which could be a false card to give declarer a losing option."

He is correct. Not only does his solution allow you to delay your decision about the lie of the heart suit, it avoids the crossruff variation, which fails on best defense if East has the club eight. So why didn't I see that? I suppose it took me so long to think of not ruffing two hearts that I wore myself out, and I gave insufficient thought to the best way to reach my hand. My instinct said to ruff a spade to force East to discard, and I didn't stop to question my instinct.

Event 3 - Match 3 - Board 4

Board 4
Both sides vulnerable

♠ A 6 4 ♥ 4 3 ♦ 8 6 4 ♣ A K Q 10 3

RHO opens one heart in third seat. I can double or I can overcall two clubs. Two clubs can make it a little harder to find a spade fit, but double leaves the main feature of my hand on the shelf. Two clubs also makes it easier for me to reenter the auction if the bidding dies at a low level. Suppose, for example, I double and the auction continues two hearts--pass--pass back to me. Now what? I'm not comfortable selling out. But three clubs would show a considerably better hand than I have. If I bid clubs first, however, I can compete with a re-opening double.

I bid two clubs. LHO bids two hearts, and partner bids three clubs. RHO bids three hearts. I pass, and LHO goes on to four hearts. I guess three hearts was invitational. Not many pairs play that way.

In some partnerships, I could lead the club queen to request count at trick one. Jack doesn't play that convention, however, so I lead the club ace.

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

West	North	East	South
Phillip	Nathanial	Jack	Marcus
	Pass	Pass	1 ♥
2 ♣	2 ♥	3 ♣	3 ♥
Pass	4 ♥	(All pass)

Partner plays the four; declarer, the nine. If a second club is cashing, I need one trick from partner. If he has a trump trick, the diamond ace, or the queen of spades (doubleton or third), there is nothing I need to do. But if he has king-queen of diamonds, I may need to switch to a diamond before my spade ace is knocked out.

If the second club isn't cashing, I need two tricks from partner. In that case, I may need to go after a spade ruff. If partner has a doubleton spade and the trump ace, I need to switch to a spade at trick two.

I was right that what I needed was a count signal. If declarer has two clubs, my best defense is (A) to cash the second club and play a diamond. If he has a singleton club, my best defense is (B) to play a low spade. Note that an obvious-shift attitude signal would not help. Partner, not knowing he needs two diamond honors for a shift to be productive, would discourage any time he has the king or queen. This would work just fine if I had a diamond honor too. Then I could adopt (A) if partner discourages and (B) if he doesn't. But, with the hand I hold, an attitude signal does not tell me what I need to know.

Jack's I-don't-have-a-club-honor signal, as usual, is no help at all. So I must simply choose the defense that works most often. For (A) to be right, I need declarer to have a doubleton club. Less obviously, I need him to have six hearts, If he has only five, he doesn't have enough pitches to get rid of all his diamonds, and there is no need for a diamond switch. That means declarer must be x-6-y-2. For (B) to be right, I need declarer to have a singleton club,and I need partner to have a doubleton spade and a doubleton ace of hearts. That gives declarer specifically 4-5-3-1.

Since (B) requires declarer to have a specific pattern and (A) requires a range of patterns, (A) is more likely to be right. It may appear that the high-card constraints counterbalanace that. (B) requires partner to have one high card (the heart ace) while (A) requires partner to have two (the king and queen of diamonds). But that's an illusion. Partner has more diamonds than hearts, so he is more likely to hold diamond honors than to hold heart honors. I won't bore you with the calculations. But it turns out partner is actually more likely to hold the king-queen of diamonds than to hold the heart ace. So (A) is a standout, at least on an a priori basis.

Of course, I've completely ignored the fact that South chose to bid three hearts over three clubs. Does the three heart bid itself suggest a singleton club? If I adopt (A), I'm playing declarer for something like

♠ Q x ♥ A K J x x x ♦ A x x ♣ x x

Three hearts would make more sense if it were competitive rather than invitational. But I don't see any reason that hand is any less likely than, say,

♠ Q x x x ♥ K J x x x ♦ A K x ♣ x,

which is a pretty thin three-heart bid whatever it means. So I'm sticking with (A).

Now that I've decided to shift to a diamond, does it matter whether I cash the club king first or not? It can't hurt to try to cash it. If the club gets ruffed, a diamond shift wasn't doing any good anyway. And not cashing it might give me a problem, since I won't be sure how many tricks I need elsewhere.

I play the club king. Partner follows with the five, and declarer ruffs with the five of hearts. Declarer plays the six of hearts--three--queen--ten. Then the deuce of hearts--jack--ace--four. How about that? Jack played the suit correctly. He guarded against the one four-zero break he could handle.

He plays the deuce of spades--four--nine--three. It appears declarer is 3-5-4-1. Unless partner has the ace-king of diamonds, we're not beating this. Declarer plays the five of diamonds--three--king. Making four.

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

Declarer was on a diamond guess. He apparently played partner for the diamond ace because he assumed I had the spade ace. But couldn't partner have ducked the spade ace? Declarer should have led the five of spades (Rule 2 for scrambling count signals ) to the king. It would be much harder for partner to duck now. From partner's perspective, declarer might have two small spades and might have just misguessed. In fact, to make this maneuver more convincing, declarer might do that at trick three, trusting us to have found a spade ruff already if one was available. It's true that if hearts were four-zero, he might regret wasting that dummy entry. But a four-zero trump break seems unlikely on the auction. I think the danger of misguessing diamonds is more pressing. As it is, the diamonds were misguess-proof.

South made a rather aggressive three heart call, apparently spurred on by his singleton club. The opponents probably would not have reached game had I passed or doubled instead of overcalling two clubs. Sometimes it seems that the worst time to bid is when your hand is pure. If all your cards are working, then all the opponents' cards are working also, and bidding just pushes them into a making game or slam that they would not have bid on their own. Perhaps two clubs is wrong. We probably can't outbid the opponents in clubs, so finding a club fit may help them more than it helps us. Maybe double, trying to find a fit where we can actually outbid them, is a better idea.

I'm not yet prepared to reach that conclusion. But I will certainly be on the look-out for additional deals involving this principle. I may change my strategy in the future. One of the things that makes bridge a difficult game to learn is that the feedback is imperfect. If you get a bad result, you can't be sure whether you did something wrong or were just unlucky. So it's easy to keep making the same mistakes over and over. To improve, you need to be continually evaluating your actions, and you need a long memory. I'm pretty good on the evaluating part. Sadly, my memory isn't what it used to be. The truth is, in a couple of weeks I'll probably have forgotten about this deal. If I do this again with a similar bad result, could you please remind me?

Luckily, our teammates reach game as well. The board is a push.

Table 1: -620
Table 2: +620

Result on Board 4: 0 imps
Total: +2 imps