Michael and I ended up in a somewhat dodgy slam today, but it was a nice sequence
.
North (Dummy) AKQJ95
J6
AJ2
KQ
4 ledSouth 106
A732
9763
A54
Bidding (Opps silent)
North South1
1
1NT
(1) 2
(2)2
(3) 2NT
(4)3
(5) 4
(6)4
(7) 5
( 8 )6
(9) All Pass
(1) Beta
(2) 4 Controls
(3) Iota in Spades
(4)
xx
(5) Repeat Iota (Sets Spades as trumps)
(6) Still
xx
(7) Epsilon in Hearts
( 8 ) 1st Rnd Control of
, no 2nd or 3rd Rnd control
(9) This pretty much
needs South to have
AJxx, since I must have
Axx(x) and cannot have the
King. A rush of blood to North's head, perhaps LOL.
What to do on the lead of the
4? It's possible that West might have led from
KQxx, in which case the
Jack will suffice for 12 tricks here. Much
more likely, in my opinion, that the lead is from
K10xx(x) or
Q10xx(x), in which case East will have to play their honour in order to beat the 9. At any rate, that is what I played for and East duly won trick one with the King and switched to a Club.
I eventually took the Diamond finesse against West for my 12th trick. Nice result, but it's worth noting that for this slam to succeed, you 100%
need West to lead a small Diamond from their hand at trick 1. Almost no other lead will allow you to make this. Even the
10 lead defeats the contract because of the finesse against the 9 on the way back.
Bidding a slam on the basis of Partner having to have cards they've not shown can be a little dodgy. Bidding a slam
knowing you have multiple "holes" (
and
here) is doubly so. Nice when you can enlist Opps' help to allow you to make it, though LOL.