LEARNING CENTER

2. From three remaining, return the lowest (or original fourth best is another way to think about this). If partner thinks we only started with three hearts, he may switch after winning trick two so it is important that we give count here. 

Look how different these two scenarios are: 

A)

	97
K1085		AJ32
	Q64

B)

	97
K1085		AJ2
	Q643

If East plays the ace then two in both scenarios, West would have no idea that it's right to cash the K at trick three in scenario A, but not in scenario B. 

8. Holding an equal honor, we like the suit by playing our higher spot card. We would rather our equal honor were the king, but we don't always get dealt it. 

3. You can "read" the spots here. Partner's four is either a singleton or from three. If partner has three, they would be the QJ4. That's impossible; partner would lead the Q. So declarer has AQJ which means that playing the K would be very helpful for declarer. Which low card doesn't matter much (it might be a suit preference signal), so give yourself full credit for any card other than the king. 

Q. If you play the ace, declarer can successfully hold up to prevent partner from taking his spade tricks. If you play the Q, declarer won't hold up for fear of losing to partner's ace. When we get in with the A later, we can play A and another. 

Test it out on the full deal:

	85  KQ3  AJ103  QJ43
J9732  1094  9832  7		AQ10  J8765  54  A86
	K64  A2  KQ7  K10952

Anything but the jack! This is a strange signaling situation since so many of the cards are "known", but the most important thing is that you know partner doesn't have both the K and Q (or he would have led the K). Playing the J gives declarer the ability to finesse in spades which he might need to do if he needs a discard. Look at the full deal and see that declarer could finesse spades to discard a heart loser if you play the J, but if you play low then the declarer has no chance. 

The full deal: 

Vul: Dlr:	A105  J876  2  KQ876
Q97  K1094  Q9854  3		J8642  AQ5  A1063  4
	K3  32  KJ7  AJ10952

It could be even worse: if declarer had Qx of spades instead of Kx, this went from a suit with one loser to a suit with no losers (thanks to partner's lead) to a suit with a an extra winner (if you play the jack).