Please note there will be no bridge on 26th and 27th December.
... to the following members who have been promoted in ABF ranking during September -
Margaret Rogers (Bronze Life), George Mackenzie (State), Dawn Wilson (Club).
Info on the rankings can be found here: http://www.abfmasterpoints.com.au/helpranklist.asp.
Players are reminded that excessive hesitation in bidding can be construed as giving information to partner. If you feel you have been affected by the opposition's excessive delay in bidding, please call the director at the time. This is a club ruling .
This hand was played on July 11. As North, find the line to make 6H on the KD lead. ( Note that any lead can still make finding the line difficult including a heart lead as long as West doesn’t cover the 10H played from dummy).
Answer: Possible losers are the QH, a diamond and a club or, alternatively, no diamonds but two clubs. To avoid losing more than one trick outside the trump suit you also have a number of possibilities, the JS could drop after three rounds, the club finesse might work, you might be able to ruff a club in dummy.
The KD lead imposes an immediate potential loser in diamonds so you would prefer to ditch the diamond loser on the QS before embarking on finesses. But with the AD gone you only have the AC to enter dummy quickly and that means forgoing the club finesse. A counter-intuitive solution which avoids taking any finesses involves winning AD , crossing to AS, playing KS, crossing back to dummy with AC and discarding the losing diamond on the QS. You now have two small clubs to manage with three trumps on the table. You cross to KC and ruff a third club round with the 10H. Despite West being able to over-ruff with the QH there is nothing she can play (including the JS which you would ruff with the 9H in hand) to stop you winning the next round in hand and ruffing your fourth club with the JH before returning to hand with a trump or by ruffing a diamond to draw the remaining trumps.
This hand was played in 4H by West on July 11 after the bidding as shown. 9D is led. Plan your play for 10 tricks.
Answer:
You have 3 x club losers and a trump loser if the finesse loses. You must therefore assume the QH lies with South, a reasonable assumption, since she opened the bidding. You could take the QD, finesse the QH return to dummy with the AH , discard your fourth diamond on the AS and plan to finesse the QH again before drawing the third round of trumps. Unfortunately, even if clubs break 3-3 you must let the opponents in three times and you will run out of trumps to trump their winners before you can win the last club.
If diamonds are 4-3 you can trump a diamond in dummy before you draw all the trumps. Despite the 9D lead this line looks more promising. You win the QD, finesse the QH, play AD and your low diamond intending to trump it in dummy. Unfortunately, North trumps first with the 5H. You must now “hold your line” and over-trump with the AH, ditch your fourth club on the AS before repeating the heart finesse.
This board was played on July 10 2016. East was in 3NT and received the lead of the 6H. You have eight tricks off the top as long as you win the lead with the AH, avoiding blocking that suit. What is your best chance of making a ninth? (Don't click on "Show All Hands" until you have worked out your answer).
You can’t lead diamonds yourself without a good chance of losing four tricks. Your extra trick has to come from spades or clubs. If either of these suits break 3-3 and you choose the right one you will make nine tricks but if six cards are outanding in a suit they will break 3-3 only 36% of the time and 4-2 nearly half the time (http://www.bridgehands.com/P/Probability_of_Card_Distribution.htm). Therefore, the odds are not on your side since you will probably only get the chance to check out one of these suits.
If you look at the middle cards you hold in the black suits you will see that you hold the 10C as well as the 9C. Therefore, you have the extra chance of either the QC or the JC being doubleton in one of the opponents hands and playing AC, KC and another club will give you the best chance of developing an extra trick.