This was a really interesting hand Eszter and I played yesterday. Positions switched for ease of reference
EW Game, Dealer NorthNorth K10
AJ6543
A5
A83
South AQ872
K7
Q963
76
BiddingNorth East South West1
No 1NT 2
2
(1) No 2
(2) 3
X
(3) No 3
(4) No
4
All Pass
(1) Alpha in
(2) No
Support, 0-3 Controls
(3) Gamma in
(4) HHxxx or HHHxx in
I was North. After the negative response to my Alpha in Hearts, I decided to forget them (it was a fairly anaemic suit) and go for Partner's Spades.
West led the
King against 4
. You take Dummy's Ace (East playing a small Club). How do you plan the play? If the Spades are behaving not too bad, then the Hearts probably aren't, and vice versa, since it looks like West has 7-card Clubs. Either way, East almost certainly has the length in Diamonds, so it's reasonable at this stage to place the
King with them.
Eszter decided to play East for something like
Jxxx and played to pin the
9 in the West hand. She played a Spade to Dummy's King and then ran the 10 on the next round. That's a reasonable enough shot, but didn't come off on this occasion, since West had
Jxx.
I feel that probably that's a case of putting
most of your eggs in one basket, because you
can't afford to willingly let West back in to cash another Club and then force us in Clubs. If The Spades are 4-2 and East gets a Spade trick, it's unlikely that
they can do you much damage because (1) they probably don't have another Club, (2) we've provisionally placed them with the Diamonds, and (3) they can't hurt you in Hearts either.
Anyway, West wins the Jack of Spades, cashes the Queen of Clubs (East discards a Diamond), and then the Jack of Clubs (East discards
another Diamond and you ruff). A third round of Spades now reveals the 3-3 split. The big question now is what you discard from
Dummy on the 3rd Spade.
This was Eszter's crucial error, I feel. She discarded Dummy's losing Diamond, pinning
all of her hopes on a 3-2 Heart split, but I feel that is ignoring the evidence from the opening lead, the bidding, and what she knows of the hand so far:
- We know West started with 7 Clubs and 3 Spades and so only 3 red cards
- If West started with 2 Hearts, that gives then a singleton Diamond and they would probably have tried for a Diamond ruff at trick 1 rather than leading the King.
- If West has 2 Diamonds, that means the Hearts are 4-1, probably with East holding Q10xx
You can't, therefore, afford to discard a Diamond from Dummy. Even if the Hearts do turn out to be 3-2, you only need
2 discards on the Hearts to make your contract, but if they're 4-1, as seems likely, you will need to be able to lead a Diamond towards your Queen. East has already discarded 2 Diamonds, so there is a decent chance of establishing your
Diamonds if the Diamonds were 5-2 originally (because they're now 3-2, East having discarded a couple).
So now cash the King of Hearts (West plays the 9), and try a Hearts towards the Ace (West discards a Club). Now you know you can forget the Hearts and Play Ace and another Diamond. Knowing East started with 5 Diamonds, it's definitely with the odds to place them with the King. Their Diamond discards don't really mean anything in that respect, because they
can't afford to discard a Heart, ever. If East goes up with the King, the rest are yours. If they don't, win the Queen and clear the Diamonds.