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Kingston Duplicate Bridge Club Inc
 DiamondClub
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Mentor game hands
Hand from Mentor Game 2023/01/05

This was the very first board of the first Mentor Game of 2023. At every table, South opened 1NT in third seat, and at half the tables, West chose to bid with the sketchy 6-card club suit; once the bid was a risky 2♣ showing a one-suited hand (part of the Cappelletti convention) forcing East to bid 2 and committing the partnership to the 3-level; once the call was a DONT double, again showing a one-suited hand (but this time the partnership could stop in 2♣); and the third call was a DONT 2♣ showing clubs and another suit (probably the safest way to compete). As the cards lie, 2♣ can always be made, but North can make things difficult by leading the singleton trump, allowing South to play three rounds of trumps, thus preventing any spade ruffs in dummy. But declarer can recover by winning the third trump in the East hand and running the spade ten (assuming it is not covered); later, South's jack of spades will fall and West's eight will become a trick, holding declarer's losses to 2 hearts, 2 trumps, and 1 spade.

At the three remaining tables, West passed over 1N, and all three Norths opted to bid 2♣ Stayman, intending to pass whether South responded 2, 2, or 2♠. This landed the three Souths in the dicey 4-3 heart fit. At all three of these tables, the defence started well with ace-king of spades and a spade ruff. At two tables, East then switched to a low trump, giving declarer a chance. Ducking this trick to West failed when West played another spade and East ruffed with the jack, promoting another trump trick for West; the winning play for declarer was to win the heart switch, take two clubs and ruff a club, then cross back to the heart king, give up a heart, and eventually discard one diamond loser on the queen of spades. However, neither declarer who faced this defence found the winning play, and both actually went down 2 when they allowed West to trump the diamond ace.

Ironically, the only time 2 made was when East found the killing defence of switching to the king of diamonds after ruffing the third round of spades. West ruffed this and played another spade, and if East had ruffed this with the Jack, declarer would have had to go down, losing another trump trick to West and a diamond to East; alas, East ruffed with the 6, so declarer could overruff with the 7 and draw West's remaining trumps with the Ace and King; then, after ruffing the club loser in dummy, declarer's only remaining loser was a diamond.

Mentor Game - December 2021

This was Board 11 from the December 2 2021 Mentor game. At most tables, the auction went as shown (one North bid 3 and played there). At the 9 tables where North played 2, every East led the 3 of spades, but none of the East-West pairs managed to find the spade ruff to hold declarer to eight tricks (a few declarers held themselves to eight tricks anyway).

Most West players correctly played the spade jack at trick one, losing to declarer’s queen; now West knows that either East had a singleton spade and declarer has Q108, or East had 1083 of spades and North had a singleton queen. Most declarers then played a heart, winning dummy’s queen when East ducked the ace. Now declarer with a singleton spade would probably take a couple of discards on the spade ace-king, so West should assume that East's opening lead was a singleton.

Now consider East; when East eventually wins the trump ace, it should be clear that West probably has one of the minor suit kings (with both minor suit kings, the queen of spades, and the king of hearts, North would have enough to invite game), so East should cash both minor suit aces to see which one West encourages. Then East can lead over to the club king, and West should give East the spade ruff. 

One last point: when East leads the second club, it should be the nine, not the five.