LOL, struggling to cope mentally with you continually moving the goalposts here: East has already shown up with KQ73, I think, if I've followed your somewhat unintuitive play diagram correctly (East played the Q under the Ace, the 7 on the next trick, discarded the 3 on the second Spade trick and then played the King on the 3rd round of Hearts.


Admittedly, if East did start off with KQ73 exactly, they know that Partner started with Jxxx after the 2nd round of the suit (when South ruffs), so there's no problem for them to discard the 3 , because they know Partner will still have the suit covered, so the location of the Jack is not now so certain.


What's the point of my trying to cope with KQ7 with East, or KJ??? with West, when I know by trick six that neither of those two situations can possibly apply? In fact I can be fairly sure by trick 4 than the second of those doesn't apply (No way East is going to pop up with the Queen in those circumstances).

I spend a fair amount of time trying to stop you guys from being so afraid of playing in Moysian fits. It's true, however, that they are not always the right answer. Take this hand that Brian Meadows and I played (as EW) today against a decent Precision pair - Matt Smith (sophrosyne) and John Schiffeler (JohnWmS) - who might be interested in switching to OCP.

All Vulnerable, Dealer North (positions changed for ease of reference)
You are South and hold
  Q
  A1043
  K752
  A842

Partner opens 1 and the bidding proceeds
1 - 1
2 - 3
3 - ??

I think it's clear here that 3 is a forward-going move by Partner with only 3-card Hearts. If they had 4-card Hearts, they'd be agreeing Hearts immediately with 2 rather than showing the Diamonds (however good they are), so the initial question here is whether you bid 4 and accept the probable Moysian fit, or 5 and go for the known 9+ card fit.

At the table John bid 4 , mistakenly thinking Matt might still have 4-card support, but a strong Diamond suit. Brian led the 10 and Dummy went down with

10 led

North
  J98
  K87
  AQJ1096
  6

South
  Q
  A1043
  K752
  A842

Easy to see that you've missed the best contract of 5 , which is absolutely solid, losing just a Spade and a Heart.

How do you plan the play in 4 , however? I suspect John panicked a little when he saw only 3-card support and proceeded to try to cross-ruff the Black suits, interrupted only by one round of trumps when Brian got in with the A . By trick 7, therefore, Declarer had won 6 tricks and still had a Diamond and the Ace of trumps to come, but that was all he could manage (and so was -2).

Cross-ruffing is sometimes the answer, but when you have a long suit you can run, especially a 10-card fit, it's much better to (1) draw trumps and then run your suit, or (2) partially draw trumps and then use your long suit as trumps in order to retain trump control. The absolute last thing you want to do is to start ruffing early before you're in a position to continue.

Option (2) doesn't really work here, because you're going to lose a Spade, 2 Hearts and two Clubs, because if you take 2 rounds of Hearts and then play on Diamonds, Opps will still have 1 Heart left when Dummy runs of Hearts and is no longer to ruff your Club losers. Better on this hand to hope for 3-3 Hearts (or perhaps even Hx with West) and to duck a Heart at trick 2, This leaves a small Heart in Dummy to cope with a Club continuation, and you can ruff a second Spade in hand if Opps switch to Spades. Now as the cards lie Opps are powerless, because you can mop up the remaining Hearts and run all of the Diamonds.

The EW cards:
West                   East

  A107                K65432
  Q96                  J52
  43                    8
  KJ1073            Q95


If you have a 10-card fit in a side-suit a cross-ruff is almost always doomed to failure, because, as here, you're inevitably going to run out of things to ruff and by this point you've completely lost any semblance of trump control.

East's Hearts
East played the Queen of Hearts on the first round of the suit and discarded a small Heart on the second round of Spades. Since West payed the Jack of Hearts on the 3rd round of Hearts, it's crystal clear that East started off with KQxxx in the suit. There's absolutely no way East would hop up with the Heart Queen from Qxxx when Declarer leads a small Heart from Dummy at trick 2.

Bidding
You didn't say who the dealer was but I'm assuming South:

1 - 1NT
2 - 3    // Gamma in
4 - 4NT   // Hxxxxxxx   /  Relay Beta
5 - 5    // 3 Controls  /  Epsilon in Hearts
5 - 6    // None or 1+2  (has to be 1+2) / Enough

Over 5 , North should be able to judge that 6 is the probable limit. South is either 83 in the Majors with AKx in , or has the stiff Ace of Hearts and 4 cards in the Minors with a guarded King somewhere. Either way there is one probable loser. It's not worth a 6!C Epsilon over 5 , because the answer doesn't really help and if South has Kx you're in 6NT with much fewer chances of garnering a 13th trick.

If North was the Dealer, then maybe:

1 - 2    // Alpha
3 - 3    // No Supp, 4+ ctrls  /  Theta
4 - 4NT   // HH  /  Relay Beta
5 - 6 /7    // 7 Controls  /  Enough or optimism rules

7 Controls marks North with AK and the Minor suit Aces (and nothing else), so there is no chance of the Queen of Clubs making an appearance. South cannot afford to ask in Clubs at the 6 level in case North is 2452 with Ax in Clubs. Impossible for North to have AAKKK, because that would be a 1 Opener. Either way, 12 tricks is the probable limit, but it's easier for South to be optimistic and envisage a 13th trick than it is for North because of the possibility North started with AK, xxxx, Axxxx, Ax

Yes, that's why I've created this Board on the Forums.

A few people have moaned about the lack of advice on Defence and Declarer Play during the OCP course. Inevitably I concentrate on bidding, because that's what OCP is all about. During most of the OCP course, I rarely allow example hands to be playe unless the play contains some interesting feature (eg: a possible squeeze or whatever).

Play is, however, a critical component in our skill as a Bridge Player. You cannot hope to improve your level of Bridge unless you devote at least as much time to improve:

• Your reading of the hand (ie: taking inferences)
• Counting the hand
• Defensive signalling and reading Partner's signals
• Effective Trump Control
• Your knowledge and awareness of tactical positions (eg: Endplays, Squeezes etc)
• No Trump tactics (eg: Holding up, throw-ins, etc)
• Consideration of tactics based on the scoring method in use (eg: Safety Plays or "going for broke")

...as you trying to improve your bidding. Indeed, many people take the view that the bidding system you use is an entirely minor consideration, and that most of the time you should concentrate on improving your play.

I don't really have the time to teach all of this stuff (the OCP Course lasts for a full 12 months as it is). I am painfully aware, however, that we all use a bidding system that gives us a huge advantage, but that advantage is often lost by the fact that play skills are not nearly as high in the case of many OCP practitioners. I have written quite a few articles on play (and bidding) (You can find them on the OCP site and on the IAC site), but this Board will allow people to highlight concerns or problem hands they have on Play, or for me to post an occasional hand that examples something in the list above.

Played a hand with Eszter last night where neither of us shone:

Opps bid to 4 via 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 . Your Partner leads a trump and Dummy goes down with

6 led.
                    KQ4
                    A653
                    J10964
                    10

You hold:
973
K9874
3
AJ32

Declarer draws trumps in 3 roundsending in Dummy, Partner showing out on the 3rd round and signalling for a Diamond. Declarer leads 10 from Dummy. What's your plan?

I erred in two ways here.

Firstly, I rose with the Ace of Clubs (which almost certainly sets up two Club tricks for Declarer). Better to duck, hope that Declarer rises with a top honour and now that's their last Club trick.

Secondly I woodenly complied with Partner's request for a Diamond and led my 3 . A decent amount of thought would have made me switch to the King of Hearts instead: Clearly Partner does not have a singleton Heart, or they'd probably have led it initially. Regardless of the Heart position, it's critical to get the Ace of Hearts off Dummy, to kill the entry to any possibly Diamond tricks.

In practice, Eszter held

62
Q2
AK872
9764

Eszter won my Diamond switch with the K . Even at this point, she should have seen the danger the Diamonds in Dummy posed and should have switched to the Q in an attempt to drive out Dummy's Ace, but she took her second Diamond trick and that was the end of the defence.

Assessing what the dangers are on a given hand is critical to good defence (and Declarer play, for that matter). Here, Dummy had no trumps left. Even if I rose immediately with the Ace of Clubs, it should only have been with the intent of leading the King of Hearts to kill dummy stone dead. Note that leading a smaller Heart isn't necessarily good enough. It has to be the King.