You hold, in 3rd seat at IMPs:
void
Qx
AKQxxxx
QTxx
Partner deals and opens 1 Heart. You are playing 2/1 Game Force. RHO passes, and you bid 2 Diamonds. Partner now surprises you and bids 3 Clubs. How do you go from there? You immediately think of a possible grand slam. If partner has AKxxx of clubs and the heart ace, it is easy to envision 13 tricks. However, partner could have as little as Jxxx in clubs, say KQx/AKxxx/x/Jxxx, so you can't commit to clubs since diamonds may be a better trump suit. So you go decide to go slowly and rebid 3 Diamonds. Partner rebids 3 No-Trump. You now decide to bid 4 Clubs to complete your description. Partner answers with a discouraging 5 Clubs. Should you bid the slam? It's not a clear decision, but you decide to take the plunge and bid 6 Clubs.
Now move into partner's chair. You get the ace of Spades lead, and you are looking at:
void
Qx
AKQxxxx
QTxx
QJx
Axxxx
void
AJ9xx
How do you play it? The most straightforward plan is to set up and use dummy's diamonds. The problem is to both set up the suit and be able to get back to dummy to run it. You have to ruff the spade. What distributions do you need to make this, and how do you take advantage if they occur? Decide before reading on.
I thought that the best chance was for clubs 2-2 and diamonds no worse than 4-2. So I ruffed a diamond and played the club jack. If either hand has Kx, they couldn't hurt me with another high spade, since I could ruff, cash the queen to draw the remaining trumps and run the diamonds. No such luck. RHO won the club king and played another spade, forcing dummy to ruff. Now when I played the club queen, LHO showed out. But all was not lost! There was still another remote chance. I started running diamonds, and RHO had to follow to 3 rounds. So I was able to pitch three heart losers. On the fifth round of diamonds, RHO ruffed and I overruffed. Now I played the heart ace, and, miraculously, RHO dropped the king! So the slam came home after all. His hand was:
xxxxx
K
JTxx
Kxx.
Note that if you do not ruff a diamond at trick 2, you cannot use the diamonds even if clubs are 2-2. If clubs are 3-1, you cannot use dummy's diamonds no matter how you play it. You will not be able to finish drawing trumps in dummy with an established diamond suit even if the king is onside and diamonds split 3-3.
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2 comments:
Nice blog, nice post.
Wouldn't it have been slightly better to lead the ace of clubs, rather than the jack? Once in a while, that K is the singleton.
This hand revisited: If you are playing for diamonds 4-2, at trick two,you can play the AK of diamonds and discard your two remaining spades. Then lead a low diamond and ruff with the 9. If they over-ruff, you claim.
If not, you play ace and another club and claim unless clubs are 4-0. The difference is that you can now ruff a spade in your hand.
It's always easier to think of these things afterwards!
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