Garden Cities

In the Garden Cities qualifier we were leading at half time but a poor second session saw us overtaken by the Allendale team. I held two very similar hands - 9 high card points and 5-5 in spades and diamonds, and both hands led to some interesting play.

Ann and I played this hand against Miles and Daphne. I led the king of diamonds and declarer won, drew trumps ending in hand and led a club up to get the bad news. Now came a diamond to my 10. I have to admit to being asleep at trick 1 and missing Ann's count signal, so I didn't want to risk underleading the queen of diamonds. When I played the queen declarer discarded a club. You can follow the play by clicking 'Next' on the diagram. The opponents were playing Lebensohl responses so South's 3♥ showed about 8-10 HCP. As partner seemed to have the queen of clubs it was very likely that declarer had the queen of spades, so I tried the effect of conceding a ruff and discard by playing another diamond.

Declarer can still succeed by discarding a spade in dummy and ruffing in hand. East has to discard a spade and now declarer can play ace and another spade, ruffing in dummy, and exit with a low club to endplay East. But it was a tricky ending and declarer went wrong by ruffing my diamond exit in dummy, going one down when the spade finesse lost.

At another table Keith was declarer and took his opportunity to impress the EBU chairman who was sitting East. Keith eliminated spades and diamonds and endplayed East in clubs to give the tenth trick.

That was a good board for our team, but we got our comeuppance on this one.

Against me, West found the devilish lead of the 8 of clubs. Thinking that the king of clubs had to be offside, I won the ace and played ace and another heart, throwing my remaining club. West cashed the ace of diamonds, which seemed helpful, but not when the next diamond was ruffed by East and a heart was ruffed by West. Two down when I was cold for two overtricks! It was little consolation that Chris had played the same way when West led the seven of clubs.

National Pairs

In the National Pairs Regional Final Ann and I had more than our fair share of good fortune and avoided too many unforced errors, coming first in the Exeter heat and 9th out of 244 in the national list. This is the sort of thing that happens if you are playing in luck - a tricky hand from the last round of the day against Roger Sweet and his partner.

I had the first close decision when I had to choose whether to protect or to sell out to 2♥. My hand was pretty awful but it's usually losing tactics at pairs to let the opponents play in an 8 card fit at the two level, so I risked a very thin double. The problem was that Ann expected a rather better hand and bid 3♠ over 3♥.  That was the wrong decision in theory, but the play's the thing...

South led the king of hearts which held the trick.  Ace and another trump is best now, but he continued with another heart and Ann had a chance. She ruffed, crossed to the king of clubs, ruffed another heart and cashed the two top clubs, throwing a heart and a diamond. Now Ann played a diamond to the king, but this lost to the ace and South played a diamond back to North's queen. North now erred by playing the ten of spades, restricting the defence to one trump trick so the contract made for a near top.

Declarer can always succeed by discarding two diamonds on the clubs. Now ruff a club to hand and ruff the last heart in dummy. This needs South to have the last club, surely a better chance than the ace of diamonds with North.

One off in 3♠ would still have been a 60% board for us. To get a good score North-South need to double. Or North could have overtaken the king of hearts at trick 1 and switched to a trump, which would have led to an easy two down.

3♥ would have been an interesting contract. Deep Finesse says that it can only be beaten by an improbable low club lead followed by a trump switch, but what would have happened on a normal spade lead? Let's assume declarer wins the ace of spades, takes two rounds of trumps and plays back a spade to establish dummy's ten. East wins, cashes the king of clubs and switches to a trump. Now declarer can only get home by drawing trumps ending in dummy, to reach this position.

Declarer plays the winning spade, throwing a low diamond from hand, and West cannot afford a discard in either minor. If he throws a diamond declarer finesses the jack of diamonds and plays a club; if he throws a club declarer plays a club immediately.

Would declarer have managed all this?  It seems an unlikely line to find at the table, but more than half the declarers in heart contracts made nine tricks. Maybe East didn't find the unblock of the king of clubs, which allows declarer to get home without the squeeze.

Diamond disasters

In the third round of the Gold Cup match we faced tough opponents in Andy Hughes' team from Hampshire. To stand any chance, we would need to play well and have some good fortune, but neither of these occurred and we lost heavily. Our only problem was the diamond suit; where diamonds were not involved we held our own, but on the ten hands where a diamond contract was declared at one or both tables we lost 64 imp.

This hand from the first set showed the way the wind was blowing.

West's 2♥ opener showed a weak hand with five hearts and a minor of at least four cards. He led a heart. Ann won this and drew two rounds of trumps, with West shedding a low club. The opponents were playing count discards and this suggested an odd number of clubs. It looked as if West's shape was 2-5-1-5 so Ann cashed a top spade in hand, crossed to dummy in trumps and led a spade to the nine. Well played but down two on this occasion. In the other room, our pair were not playing two-suited openers so declarer had no clue to the defenders' distribution and played spades from the top.

That was an unlucky way to lose 11 imps, but this was more culpable.

I eventually decided to pass 4♥. This was the wrong move when partner had

                                                  ♠ Q 5 3    ♥ A 9 7 3   ♦ 10 5   ♣ K 9 7 3

When the trumps didn't break declarer lost control and finished three down. In the other room my hand just bid 5♦ directly over 3♠, which was an easy make. 4♥ might have been the right contract but a quick simulation on BBO showed that 5♦ was much more likely to be a better spot.

Yet another mishap around the diamond suit -

The defence started with three rounds of spades and then West switched to a heart, so that East was able to ruff a heart for 800 in the out column. In the other room East (reasonably enough) chose to pass over 1NT, South jumped to 3♦ and the opponents finished in 4♥. West might have doubled but, with no guarantee of any tricks in partner's hand, was scared of pushing the opponents into a making 5♦ contract. 4♥ drifted four down but we lost 9 imp.
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