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An innocuous little hand from 28th November. This was our bidding which I think was repeated elsewhere. Perhaps Natashas 3H was a bit of a push but we ended up in an unmakeable game contract.

Others were more wily and found the diamond fit. In fact 5D can always make.

How do you find the fit?

Any comments?

What happened at your table?

philip@thompsonsonline.net

This is something I am not good at. - when to stop digging a hole.

As East I would have gone on bidding hearts, probably to slam level if pushed by North South

As North or South I would probably gone on bidding Spades.

How do you know when to stop?

As it was 13 tricks are on offer in Hearts and 9 tricks thereabouts in Spades.

One pair ended up in 5H doubled making.

 So our opponents were wise to stop!

Any comments?

philip@thompsonsonline.net

Several interesting points on this hand.

You will see our bidding as shown.

First question was my 3S bid correct? Its our first hand and I am aware that I am preempting partner as well as the opposition, but with that shape I decided 3S was correct. Comments?

After my negative response to RKCB I still think Natasha's 6S looks good.

On a diamond lead I have no choice to go up with the Ace.

I crossed to hand and tried the failing Spade finesse. After that I tried the heart finesse the normal way ie. towards Ace and again failing and getting ourselves a bottom.

I must admit I did not think of the alternative of a ruffing finesse. For those of you who have not come across this before the plan would be to take AH and then lead another H towards my hand, if KH appears I trump if it does appear I throw one of the losing clubs.In this case I would have needed to lead AH and then a small heart trumping out the King, as the cards lie this strategy would have succeeded. Had I thought about it I think I would have still gone the same way as I would not expect the 2 relevant kings to be in the same hand. Hindsight is a wonderful thing!

Of course you could say that bidding a slam that relies on one of 2 finesses working was risky in the first place!

Any comments?

philip@thompsosnonline.net

Little harm in pre-empting your partner, it tells him exactly what your hand is.  Also bidding a small slam needing 2 finesses gives you a 75% chance of making  - well worth it.

On the play, even if the H finesse works you still only have 11 tricks since you can only do it once and will end up with a C loser as well as the KS.  You need to ruff a C (with the AS) before drawing all trumps.  You then take the H finesse and lose anyway.The ruffing finesse works in this case since the KH drops on 2nd round, but the odds are poor.  Ironically you are more likely to make 12 tricks if not in the slam as you would probably not bother with the H finesse.

Ian

  I opened 3S, seemed a good pre empt to me, but Jenny only responded 4S, so there we stopped, I would probably have gone to 4NT, but Jenny is less gung-ho The lead was 3D, so by taking this with AD, then playing AH, I was able to rough in N, and rough in S with C having taken the first 2 tricks with AC and KC. 12 tricks made, was I just lucky! Peter

Peter

If I  am correctly following the order in which you played the cards on this hand , when you play a third round of clubs in order to ruff in dummy ,  should  east not ruff first in order to force you to over-ruff with your Ace and thwart you from ruffing two clubs ?

Malcolm

This is first trial in a series of tips , from our actual play, that you may find useful.

Please give us feedback.

The illustrated hand came when Natasha and I were playing Helen & Lynda.

Helen opened 1NT and Lynda took a long time thinking - as she should.- before bidding 3NT.

Lynda knows that there are not technically enough points for game - even if Helen has 14.

However the diamonds may quite possibly give 6 tricks - Helen's hand should then produce the other 3 even if she only has 12 points.

Helen played for the drop (technically correct with no other clues to help her)

Its a gamble because Lynda does not have another entry in her hand so the fail safe approach of losing a diamond to ensure the rest are good is not available.

However I think it is a gamble worth taking and certainly worked in this case.

Any comments?

philip@thompsonsonline.net

It is perhaps worthy of looking for a heart fit as the west hand is so distributional . You could bid stayman and if you did not receive a 2Hreply , then you could still jump to 3NT . 

You would probably make 4H on this particular hand and if , but only if , you could see all four hands you could make 6H on this hand !

Best wishes - Malcolm

West should always investigate Stayman first with this type of hand to check for a heart fit. Four Hearts is the safer contract here. The trumps provide additional stops for West's short clubs and spades suits. An added benefit is that with the most likely 3-2 split of the opponents trumps, an additional means of accessing the winning diamonds is created. No need to worry about the diamond finesse or drop decision then. (Needless to say we were in 3 No Trumps !)  Tom

Another interesting hand doubling as both hand of the week and with 2 coaching points.

Do you have a system to show something specific with a jump bid over partners first bid?

We use a system that says this is the suit partner - don’t argue with me. In this case this is a bit of an overbid on my part (it’s not really solid) but I am already thinking slam.

Others use a jump bid like that to show 16 plus, but there are other ways of doing that eg Jacoby or a jump raise later.

You really  ought to know what your system is?

The second coaching point. We play RKCB - so what suit am I asking for ? The last bid - spades or my overriding hearts?
In this case if it was in hearts ie. She has my 2 vital Aces and QH I should really be thinking about 7 hearts.

As it Is I am not really sure , I think it is probably a Spades response. The other problem I have is RKCB if spades is the anchor suit I could be missing A&K diamonds.

In this case I would rather have been played standard Blackwood.

Would you and your partner be clear in this situation.

it all worked out ok on this occasion but there is some more work needed on our system.

2 pairs bid the slam.

Any comments?

philip@thompsonsonline.net

Hi Phil
Helen and my bidding went as follows..
1s 3h 4h 4nt 5h (2aces) 5nt 6c ( no kings) 6 h. I was reluctant to go to 7h with 2 missing kings. A 3s lead from south and 9s from west meant the king came out, won with the ace. After the trumps were  played the rest of the tricks were won with losers discarded from all the winning spades so we made 13 tricks. Almost any other lead would have only made 12. Lucky!
L
My jump bid showed about 16 points and very good hearts. 

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