He Did What?

By: Larry Cohen

He Did What?

This deal comes from the same knockout teams tournament as last month (a local Regional I played in). With neither side vulnerable, I held:

spadesAKQ75
heartsJ6542
diamondsA
clubs65.

I opened 1spades icon and after partner's 1NT response I rebid 3hearts icon. Really? A small caveat: we were playing a strong-club system. So, my hand was limited to about 15 HCP. In that system, 3hearts icon shows something like this (5-5 and just short of a strong club opener). In Standard, opener is not strong enough for a GF jump-shift. My counterpart at the other table rebid a proper 2hearts icon. It didn't matter much, because the opposite hand had enough to bid again and the normal 4hearts icon contract was reached at both tables

How should declarer play on the J (standard) lead?

 

 

Vul:None
Dlr: South
2
♥ KQ83
♦ K1076
♣ K842
 
 
♥ 
♦ 
♣ 
  
♥ 
♦ 
♣ 
  AKQ75
♥ J6542
♦ A
♣ 65
 

East is marked with the clubs iconAQ, so you might as well play low from dummy. The jack holds and is followed by the 10. Again, you play low from dummy and the 10 holds. Next comes the 9, low, queen and you ruff. And now?

There are no problems in the side suits, so the key is to avoid a second trump loser. If you play a trump at trick 4 and it goes low, queen, ace, you face a big problem. East plays the 4th club. If you ruff high and trumps are 3-1, you lose a second trump trick. If you trump low, you might get overruffed.

So, the right plan at at trick 3 is to risk a terrible spade break and play the spades iconAK throwing dummy's last club. Then lead a trump (unblock the diamonds iconA at an appropriate time). All that is lost are the 3 top tricks. One spade can be eventually trumped in dummy and the other goes on the diamonds iconK. This was the Real Deal:

 

 

Vul:None
Dlr: South
2
♥ KQ83
♦ K1076
♣ K842
 
J843
♥ A
♦ Q8532
♣ J109
  1096
♥ 1097
♦ J94
♣ AQ73
  AKQ75
♥ J6542
♦ A
♣ 65
 

 

The indicated line works. Also, if you (erroneously) play a low heart at trick 2, you luckily survive. West's singleton hearts iconA spares you any difficulty. So, why publish this deal?

The expert at the other table found a way to go down! At trick 3, he played the spades iconA and then ruffed a spade in dummy to play a low heart.

It is true that you can pick up a 4-0 break with West having  hearts iconA1097 by starting the suit this way, but that opens up a different can of worms.

On the actual layout, declarer paid a big price. West won the hearts iconA and played a third round of spades. This promoted a trump trick for East, down one and a 10-IMP loss.