Answer

The defence has two obvious tricks, a heart trick already in the bag with ♣A in due course [you hope], but where is the third (setting) trick going to come from? Partner may of course have a trump trick for his double but if he has, it can't run away. Here are the options at trick two:

1. a club... well, I suppose partner just might have a singleton club, but that seems very long odds.
2. a low diamond... this option looks very risky, if declarer has ♦Q a diamond switch will surely cost a vital trick.
3. a top heart... passive, but this looks a lot safer than a diamond.
4. a spade... wake up at the back, there — South has no spades!

So did you opt for the "safe" heart continuation rather than the admittedly risky diamond switch? Think again, there's a fundamental flaw in this thinking...

Partner has shown 4-card support with his raise of your opening heart bid (we play Acol, 4-card majors) so NS have an ELEVEN card heart fit between them! This means that a heart return will give declarer a ruff and discard, with dummy's potential diamond loser disappearing straight away, as declarer can ruff in hand! So in reality, a diamond switch (superficially risky) can't cost and is in fact the defence's only realistic hope of a trick in that suit. You hope that partner has ♦Q (not unreasonable after his penalty double) so you can establish a diamond winner while you still have ♣A, stopping the run of the clubs for discards.

Take another look at the title of this Hand of the Month, Where does defence start? In the bidding! If North hadn't stretched to support partner's 1♥ opener, this inference from the bidding would not have been available to South.

At our table, Andy thought for a few moments before switching to a diamond. As he said afterwards, "You had to have something for your double" [though he didn't know how little that was, but in fact my ♦QJ was more than adequate]! He was also worried I might have found a 2♥ raise with just 3-card support, though he knows that's not my style. Click on Show All Hands to see the full layout.

Of course, if North passes West's overcall of 1♠ ("I couldn't bid, partner, I only had 4 points") then South has little idea what to expect from partner in either the subsequent bidding or play, and in that case a heart continuation is much more likely. Is there a moral there? Well yes, I'll leave you to work that one out.

Equally, if West makes a weak jump overcall of 2♠ on the first round, then North surely doesn't have enough to support at the three-level with that unappealing hand. The moral this time is fairly clear... pre-empts work. Maybe it's time to start playing weak twos and weak jump overcalls, if you don't already?

The rest of the play didn't take long. My ♦J forced out dummy's ♦A, to Andy's relief. Declarer drew trumps and led a club towards dummy's ♣K. Andy, quite rightly, could see little point in holding up. He took his ♣A and led ♦K with a shrug to put us all out of our misery, one way or the other. We were both relieved to see declarer follow with a diamond, so that was one down doubled, for +200 our way.

My initial thought was that one down would be a top for us, especially doubled vulnerable for the so-called "magic 200" score. But after a brief discussion at the table, I started to suspect that against somewhat less aggressive bidding than we had experienced at our table, many NS pairs might be left to play in a game contract in hearts. In fact eleven tricks make comfortably for South in a contract of 5♥ as the cards lie, so +200 might well turn out to be not such a good score, after all.

However, looking at the traveller the next day, all was well, NS were in spades four out of five times the board had been played, usually making eleven tricks. Andy was [presumably] the only defender to find the diamond switch at trick two to hold declarer to ten tricks in spades and get us a top on the board. It was only a few days later that I twigged why everyone else defending a spade contract had made only two tricks... the heart continuation looks so much safer than a diamond switch (regardless of how the bidding went at the other tables), but in fact it gifts the eleventh trick to declarer. Not an easy one.

Well defended Andy, and well bid Keith & Steve, your 5♠ bid deserved a better score.

The bidding

Oh yes, and here's some notes on the bidding, for those who are interested:

1. 1♥ — An immediate 4♥ might work out well here, but it's not the right bid. The hand is much too strong for a pre-empt, you may miss a slam if partner has some values.

2. 1♠ — West might bid a Weak Jump Overcall of 2♠ (if EW play them). If they do, it's a fairly marginal choice between 1♠ and 2♠ to be honest, but the WJO has a lot to recommend it.

3. 2♥ — North's 10-loser hand is a touch weak for a raise to 2♥, but if you don't show your 4-card support for partner's hearts now, when are you going to get a better chance?

4. 4♠ — East's jump to 4♠ is to make or spoil... I like that bid, it puts the pressure on South. A bid of just 3♠ (to "the level of the fit") would be a bit feeble with this shapely hand, and the opponents are likely to bid 4♥ anyway, in which case EW may well be faced with having to "make the last guess" in a competitive auction, something to be avoided if possible.

5. 5♥ — South is now faced with a "Double, Bid or Pass" dilemma, but in this case, with a void in spades and solid hearts, a raise to 5♥ is pretty clear-cut — after partner has supported hearts (remember the bidding?), he knows that his lovely hearts can be worth (at most) one trick in defence, whereas they're worth seven tricks playing in a heart contract.

6. 5♠ — Another "Double, Bid or Pass" dilemma now, this one for West, and a much trickier decision than South's. It's marginal, but that spade suit is a lot better than promised by the 1♠ overcall, and the hand has little defence against a heart contract.

7. X — Now it's NS who have the tricky "Double, Bid or Pass" decision again over West's 5♠ bid. They say "the five-level is for the opposition" in a competitive auction, so surely that must be true at the six-level? But South might be tempted to bid 6♥, he'd already bid a very confident 5♥ with little encouragement.

Normally, I'd have passed 5♠ in a flash — after all, I couldn't have been much weaker for my 2♥ raise — but I decided to try to help partner and get in first with a double of 5♠ to discourage him from competing further. On my feeble hand I preferred to take our chances in defeating 5♠ rather than hoping partner has play for an improbable 6♥ our way.  And anyway, I reasoned that even if 5♠ doubled does make, it would probably not score much worse than the same contract undoubled (you can't score worse than a bottom)... so in a sense you could view this one as a "free double".

Looking at the double-dummy statistics for the deal, 5♥ makes for NS and 4♠ makes for EW. So the optimum outcome on the board is precisely the contract that was bid at our table, namely 5♠x-1 by EW. But to be honest, it could have gone either way, let's not pretend that bidding is an exact science.

If the outstanding hearts had broken 2-0, declarer would have an easy twelve tricks in 6♠ on a heart lead and it would have taken an unlikely diamond lead to defeat the slam. The write-up would now be entirely different, admiring the way Ron & Malcolm bid to a brave 6♥ contract — only one down for a great save, or might they have pushed the opponents into a making 6♠ slam?!

Dave Simmons
October 2023

The key to this lead problem is some high-card points (HCP) analysis... don't be put off if you think this sort of thing is for experts only, it's pretty straightforward in this case. NS have advertised a likely 25-26 HCP (or more) between them by bidding to an uncontested 3NT contract. You are looking at 14 HCP in your hand. All that's required is basic arithmetic to estimate partner's likely HCP, knowing there are precisely 40 HCP in the pack... they have a probable yarborough, with a single Jack at most (or even a Queen on a good day, if the opponents are pushing it a bit).

With that in mind, it should become obvious to the defender on lead (once they think about it) that the defence are very unlikely to be able to make any more than the four top tricks West can already see in their hand. The best defence (at MP scoring) is now clear — simply cash your top tricks to restrict declarer to nine tricks... it's quite likely they can make ten tricks in the other two suits, on the lead, given half a chance. So here's the marks:

(a) a low spade or club. 1 mark.  There's nothing wrong in principle with leading low from AKxx against a NT contract, but not here. It will almost certainly gift declarer an extra trick with one of declarer's presumed black queens, and they will surely be able to cash [at least] another nine tricks in the red suits for an easy top.

(b) a top spade or club. 10 marks.  As discussed above, this is clearly the best defence, intending to simply cash out. It has the additional benefit of holding the lead to have a look at dummy before continuing... just in case [see later].

(c) a heart. 4 marks.  Passive leads can be effective against NT contracts at MP scoring, but not here. If partner does by a miracle hold a possible trick in hearts with an unsupported jack or queen, this lead will more than likely kill that honour stone dead. If partner has nothing in hearts, it won't achieve anything either.

(d) the singleton diamond. 0 marks.  As Alan Mould would say, I can see no good reason for this lead.

Surprisingly, only one other pair were in 3NT, and they got the benefit of a heart lead, for an outright top on the night, as they can gratefully run for home (they have six diamonds and three hearts off the top). As the cards lie, a low club lead would also have defeated the contract whereas a low spade lead would have conceded an unnecessary overtrick... but that's just down to pure chance, and not from any intrinsic merit of leading a low club as opposed to a low spade.

How did you do?
 

As a bonus for the Hand of the Month. let's see what actually happened next, which is also instructive:

West gets off to a good start by leading ♣A and dummy goes down with 12 HCP and a stonking diamond suit. Tip: a bidding sequence like this strongly suggests that dummy has no 4-card major, as NS have not bothered with Stayman, so don't be too surprised to see a good long minor suit appear in dummy.  After a look at dummy, a quick recalculation on the HCP analysis front suggests that partner could now just have enough to hold a queen, so long as South was minimum for their 1NT opening (with the points divided 12-12 between declarer and dummy). The defence has suddenly got a bit more interesting. You did pay attention to partner's signal on the opening lead, didn't you?!

West now cashes the other black ace, again watching intently for partner's signal. Assuming EW play the customary attitude signals on an Ace lead against a NT contract, East should have played an encouraging card on the ♣A and a discouraging card on the ♠A. It's starting to look like partner really does have ♣Q all along.

On that basis, it costs nothing for West to switch to a club rather than a spade after cashing their four top tricks... bingo, partner produces ♣Q and cashes another club, salt in the wound, for a pretty unlikely two down, a clear top on the night. Click on Show All Hands to see the full details. Note that a switch to a spade at trick 5 would gift declarer the contract, as the cards lie. So make sure you've got a simple sensible agreement with your partner about defensive signalling — after all, you defend 12 deals a night on average, so reliable defensive signals are required a lot more often than the latest fancy bidding gadget.

A final amusing point, which Malcolm spotted on the night. The defence can do even better if Ron switches to a low club at trick 3, hoping for East to fire back ♠10 through declarer's presumed ♠Qx(x) holding. The 3NT contract is now an incredible FIVE down as the cards lie. However, I'd rate that defence by EW as being a touch greedy — after all, a top's a top (you can't do better than 100% at MP scoring)! 

To be fair, to find that double-dummy defence is pretty unlikely... and anyway it's probably too risky to even consider at MP scoring (where just one down on that lie of the cards feels like Christmas has come early for the defence).  But at Teams, where there's relatively little to lose from this play if partner doesn't have ♣Q — probably just an overtrick — and a lot to gain if they have, it's a possibility I suppose.

Dave Simmons
May 2023

Let's forget the bidding (which would win no prizes, despite ending up in a not unreasonable slam) and concentrate on making 12 tricks on a spade lead.

It shouldn't take you too long to come to the conclusion that the slam depends on bringing in the heart suit for one loser, missing just ♥KQxx between the two hands. The main alternatives for avoiding two losers in the heart suit are fairly obvious:

1) Lay down ♥A and play a second heart — a big winner if North has a singleton ♥K or ♥Q and a big loser if South has ♥KQx. It also works when trumps break 2-2 as the defenders' honours will crash on the second round.

2) Take a double heart finesse through South, assuming of course that South doesn't play a heart honour on the first round — a big winner when South has ♥KQx(x) and a big loser only when North has a doubleton ♥KQ.

In many cases, the above approaches either both succeed (eg the two key heart honours are split between the two defenders), or both fail (eg North has ♥KQx), so declarer can just smile inwardly or shrug his shoulders, whatever he does. I'm not sure there's much in it to be honest, they both look like an evens chance to me, though an expert might be able to tell you the precise odds of either approach succeeding.

For right or wrong, at the table I decided to go with the second option, the double finesse.

I won the opening lead with ♠A, crossed to ♠K and took the first heart finesse, dummy's ♥J losing to North's ♥K.  Then I crossed to ♣K, congratulated myself on noticing that I still needed to cash ♠Q while I had the chance (discarding dummy's losing club) and led a second heart, staking everything on bringing in the long heart suit. To my disappointment, South again played low, so there was going to be no easy ride on this one.

The moment of truth had arrived. If South has played low from ♥Qx on the first round I need to finesse by playing ♥10; whereas if North has played ♥K from the doubleton ♥KQ holding I need to play for the drop, going up with my ♥A. It looks like "toss a coin time", either North or South has the ♥Q and there's only two hearts left out... but is it?

I changed my mind at the last minute and decided to play for the drop... North showed out and the roof fell in. But going down in a making slam tends to be a bottom at MP scoring, whether one down or four down.

For those who haven't heard of it, this situation is an example of the Principle of Restricted Choice (PRC), which claims that having played ♥K on the first round, North is now twice as likely to have had the bare ♥K rather than a doubleton ♥KQ. If you don't believe me, look it up on the internet — it's mathematically correct though somewhat counter-intuitive. The argument is in essence that if North had held both missing heart honours, ♥KQ, they could equally as well have played ♥Q as ♥K on the first round, so the fact that they actually played the ♥K gives a presumption that they didn't have ♥Q (ie they had a restricted choice).

If you're not persuaded by this explanation, you're in good company — many remain unconvinced. But the PRC is true... mathematically speaking, at least.

Note however that

a) The PRC is a Principle, not a Law, Just because the PRC may recommend taking a finesse in a particular situation, there's no guarantee that the finesse will work every time!

You can take guidance from the PRC at the bridge table for years whenever a situation like this crops up, and you should end up a winner on average, but that's no guarantee that it will work for you on any particular occasion, sometimes you're just unlucky and guess wrong... the honour isn't always a singleton, and sometimes you'll end up looking stupid by taking the second finesse.

b) Bridge is not just a game of probability and statistics [thank goodness]

Maybe South is a familiar opponent who you happen to know has a habit of always false-carding with their top honour in this situation (too clever by half), or a player who will always follow suit with the lowest card from equals (too honest for their own good)? For what it's worth, the expert advice to a defender when playing from a choice of equals like this is to simply choose one or other card at random, in case declarer has been studying your track record (though in practice that's likely to be irrelevant). The key thing is to play a card smoothly, without hesitation, when you do have a choice.

Or maybe South squirmed when you led the second heart, even if almost imperceptibly, holding the ♥Q. Some players claim to have "table presence" and be good at sniffing out key honours in this sort of situation by the defender's body language. Not so easy on BBO, of course! But all sorts of things change the odds (including the bidding, the defensive lead, and so on), and the PRC may sometimes be just irrelevant or plain misleading.

I had nothing to go on, neither defender showing any obvious unease, and I guessed wrong. I should have believed the PRC in this case, stuck to my guns and taken the second finesse.

In fact, I've just realised one subtle reason for preferring the first approach (namely playing ♥A on the first round) which has nothing to do with the lie of the cards, the odds or the PRC. If both opponents play low, it's now too late to change your mind, wondering if South might have had ♥KQx all along. All you can do is lead a second heart and hope for the best. With the second approach, the double finesse, you still have the "opportunity" to change your mind after the first round of hearts and, believe me, there are few things more irritating at bridge than talking yourself out of a winning guess!

Congratulations if you picked a winning line, and stuck to it... click on Show All Hands to see the actual layout of the suit.  I had no excuses this time, I should have followed my original intentions and taken the double finesse, or just laid down the ♥A on the first round. Either line would have worked at the table, but not the one I chose, changing horses in mid-stream.

Dave Simmons
April 2023

PS If you want an explanation of our slightly unorthodox bidding to a slam on this one, just mail me.

Bidding is down to "system", style and opinion, so the bidding shown is just my view about how it might reasonably go. These are the things you might like to consider:

1. What should North open?  What should he plan to rebid (if anything)?
2. How should East compete? 
3. Which is more important, high-card points or shape?
4. What effect does the vulnerability have?
5. Which is better, a 5-4 fit or a 7-2 fit?
6. What is the "optimal" contract

There are no right or wrong answers in the bidding, but here's my thoughts (for what they're worth) —

1. North's wonderful hand with 7510 shape is way too strong to open a "standard" 3♠ pre-empt. A 4♠ opener may work well here, but I'd be inclined to open 1♠, planning to rebid diamonds (twice if necessary) to show a big 2-suiter. 1♠ is a perfectly valid "rule of 20" opener, and with a spade suit, you aren't going to get outbid easily.

2. East can overcall in hearts, but with another fabulous 2-suited hand with 7510 shape he should be looking to get both suits into the bidding rather than just one. If you play it, a conventional bid showing a 2-suited hand is probably best here. In the bidding shown, it's a Michaels cue bid showing (in this case) hearts and a minor. Otherwise East can overcall in hearts, then plan to bid and rebid clubs if necessary, again showing 5-5 shape or better.

3. It's easy to count High card points, whereas evaluating shape is a lot more difficult, and only comes with experience. It's easy to underestimate "The Power of Shape" (the title of a bridge book by the Autralian expert Ron Klinger). Andrew Robson's relevant ditty is "six-five, come alive!".  Here, two players have the even better seven-five shape of 7510... if there's a fit here, the sky's the limit!

4. At the high level, vulnerability is a crucial factor in all the "double, bid of pass" considerations. You need to know the basics of scoring, so a non-vulnerable game to NS is worth 420 but just two down doubled vulnerable for EW costs 500. So sacrificing is unattractive at unfavourable vulnerability. But vulnerability isn't the only consideration. Both North and East will be desperate to be declarer holding those long suits... the long hearts and spades are of no defensive value, but must be worth a lot of tricks if you're playing the hand.

5. There's not much in it, but a 5-4 trump fit is likely to play well, as you should have enough trumps to establish and run the longer suit as a side suit for [many?] tricks (so long as the defence can't cash-out first).

6. Looking at the makeable contracts (double-dummy), North can make 6♦ (an unlikely spade lead defeats 6♦ by South) and East/West can make 4♥. So theoretically, the optimal contract on the board is 6♥ doubled by East/West two down, scoring 500 to North/South. But in practice, any pair who bid and make a contract at the 5-level have judged well — 5♦ or 5♠ are good for NS and 5♥ should be a good sacrifice for EW. With big distributional hands like this (and double-fits emerging in the bidding), no-one should be selling out in the bidding at the 4-level on this board, in my opinion.

So in Andrew Robson's terms, the answer to this "Double, Bid or Pass" dilemma is a resounding BID, for both sides!  EW should bid 5♥ over a 4♠ or 5♦ game by NS, and NS should bid 5♠ or even punt a risky 6♦ over 5♥.  But it's not an easy one.

Notes on the bidding —

2♠    — Michaels cue bid, [here] showing "the other" major and an unnamed minor with 5-5 shape or better (Michaels is often played "weak or strong").
X     — This double is penalty-orientated... showing strength in the suits shown or implied by the Michaels cue bidder. It also suggests no great support in spades (likely to be 2 cards or less).
2NT — Asking partner to bid his other suit, implying a shortage in hearts, and reasonable support in at least one of the minors
X     — This second double is clearly for penalties.  South is expecting 4♣ to be a bloodbath.  North has other ideas...
X     — This third double is clearly for penalties.  South is also expecting 4♥ to be a bloodbath.  Again, North has other ideas...
4♥     — Hearts are [at least] one card longer than clubs (so shape is 6-5 or 7-5)
4♠      — Spades are [at least] one card longer than diamonds (so shape is 6-5 or 7-5)
5♦     — South finally gets the message, partner really doesn't want to defend on this one!

Notes on the play —

No heroics are required for EW to make 10 tricks in hearts. And 11 or 12 tricks are readily available to NS in diamonds or spades.

As ever, "Play it Again" is a useful double-dummy tool to see how a given contract can be made (or defeated), but no-one has the benefit of this at the table of course. I would say any NS who bid a slam did pretty well to do so... I'd guess they may well have been pushed there. As the cards lie, 6♦ is the winning choice of slam, whereas 6♠ is not so fortunate, hitting an unavoidable trump loser on the 4-0 spade break... but bidding never was an exact science.
 

Dave Simmons
July 2022

Perhaps not so lucky to be dealt this 30 point hand, as most club players don't have the mechanism to bid extreme hands like this with any accuracy. Technically, the 3NT rebid shown is a significant underbid as it shows a balanced 25-27 hand in standard Acol. But that's how the vast majority of the field bid it (some after opening an Acol 2♣, others after a Benji 2♦) despite the danger of missing a cold 6NT slam if there's even a few points opposite. The final contracts mostly varied between 3NT or 6NT and 4♠ or 6♠ with just one pair boldly punting the grand slam in 7♠ as shown. Bidding the grand slam is not an unreasonable shot after that bidding.

As you can see, if you ended up playing in 6NT — as quite a few Souths did — hard luck!  There look to be 12 tricks at first glance, but the spades are blocked so declarer has absolutely no chance of making the NT slam as the cards lie.

In fact, most club players have very little experience of bidding hands like these, and unsurprisingly there were at least a couple of amusing bidding disasters on this board: 4♣ and 6♥ stand out on the travellers as less-than-ideal contracts. It's easy to laugh at these outcomes, but hands like these are a minefield, as few pairs will have ever discussed the meaning of the final bid in obscure bidding sequences such as 2♣ – 2♦ – 3NT – 4♠ or 2♣ – 2♦ – 4NT – 5♣ (the sort of bidding which which only crops up once in a blue moon).

Those pairs who managed to reach a spade contract one way or another were a lot better off. There's now no entry problems so there's an easy 12 tricks off the top, and those who bid the slam in 6♠ scored very well. Several declarers spotted the line to make all 13 tricks in a spade contract — the thirteenth trick must come from a heart ruff... so long as declarer doesn't thoughtlessly draw all three rounds of trumps before thinking about how to make more than the obvious 12 tricks (it is MPs, after all). Well done Colin.

In fact, the only pair to bid the grand slam in 7♠ on the bidding shown were rather fortunate to make it. Declarer just drew trumps, discarded a heart on the second top club and played off winners... at the twelfth trick, West is down to ♥Q and ♦J and is pseudo-squeezed on the lead of the final trump. As the play went, the defender has no way of knowing whether declarer still has a heart or a diamond in their hand and guessed wrong (we've all been there), though discarding the ♦J looks the better bet to me.

For those connoisseurs of squeezes and the Bridgewebs "Play it again" facility, it's worth mentioning that a robot declarer can also make 13 tricks on a similar line despite cashing three rounds of trumps prematurely, but with a genuine squeeze, not a pseudo-squeeze. Declarer wins the first 8 tricks the same way, but needs to retain an entry to the diamond menace by crossing to hand with a club ruff at that point (rather than cashing a second top diamond), and then runs the remaining trumps.

Play it through yourself and see how the double squeeze almost plays itself, so long as North retains a diamond entry to the South hand before cashing his remaining trumps.

I wonder if robots smile to themselves after coming up with lovely lines like that?! 
 

Dave Simmons
March 2021

One of Andrew Robson's trademark phrases is to award the accolade "key play" to a clever play by declarer or defender. On this occasion, the solution involves not one but five key plays, packed in to the first four tricks!

Trick 1.  Duck the ♠J and ruff the opening lead high in hand (with the ♣A if you like showboating). You know West has the ♠A, and you need to hang on to that ♠K for a few more tricks.

Trick 2. Play the ♦A. You need to unblock the diamond suit early.

Trick 3. Cross to dummy by playing ♣8 to dummy's ♣9. Making the most of those trump entries comes in handy later (on some lines).

Trick 4. The coup de grace... lead the ♠K and discard the ♦7, a classic loser-on-loser endplay leaving West on lead. This really is THE key play.

At this point, West can only cash one heart winner, conceding the rest.

Alternatively, if West leads another spade, declarer can ruff in hand and discard a heart from dummy, later conceding just one heart (as he can ruff the other two in dummy).

And finally, if West switches to a diamond still hoping to make two heart tricks, he'll soon realise the error of his ways, and actually concede an overtrick. The diamond can be ruffed high and those carefully preserved low trumps ♣2 and ♣3 provide declarer with two further entries to dummy to establish and run dummy's diamond suit, providing discards for all three of those losing hearts.

This solution contains nothing that is impossible for an experienced club player to come up with, but it consists of an unusual combination of a number of "standard" declarer techniques, all in the one deal:

• Ducking the opening lead in a suit contract
• Unblocking a side suit early
• Preserving low cards to generate extra entries
• Making a loser-on-loser play
• Losing the lead to the "safe hand"
• Making a textbook throw-in and endplay

Note that a deceptively similar line (♠K from dummy, then playing loser-on-loser at trick 1 by throwing a diamond on West's ♠A) fails on a club switch at trick 2, as there now aren't enough entries to establish dummy's diamonds. You can check out the details yourself if you prefer, via the Play it again button.

Stop Press: This deal was published in Andrew Robson's column in the Times on 14th December, 2020.  If you want to read his version, click here: Andrew Robson 201214.pdf.

Dave Simmons
October 2020

Well, after that bidding, it's obvious there's some freak distribution about, so you need to worry about the possibility of defensive ruffs. For West to make a pre-emptive weak jump overcall at unfavourable vulnerability missing ♥AKQ10, she must surely have at least a 7-card heart suit. Similarly East must have at least a 6-card club suit to bid at the 4-level missing ♣AK, and probably has [at most] a singleton heart, or he'd have passed.

Anyway, trick one is easy, call for dummy's singleton ♥A with fingers crossed... phew, it's not ruffed. What next? Do you take the trump finesse, or bang out ♠A and another, attempting to minimise the risk of a ruff. Both lines could be a spectacular success or failure, depending on the trump layout. Suzanne decided on the natural line of taking a trump finesse at trick 2.

West won with the ♠K and returned a second heart. Do you let the heart return run to your ♥ KQ10? If so, you're down straight away, as East ruffs! Did you carelessly lead dummy's ♠10 at the previous trick, hoping to repeat the trump finesse if it held? If so, you're still down straight away! East can now over-ruff the second heart.

At the table, Suzanne ruffed the second heart high with dummy's carefully preserved ♠10, but was still faced with the problem of returning to hand to draw trumps. Clearly, it can only be done with a ruff in clubs or diamonds. She thought long and hard. Holding a singleton, going for a club ruff seems the obvious route, but if West is void in clubs (likely on the bidding), trying to cross in clubs will be fatal. Even if West has a singleton club, there may be a defensive trump trick, if the trumps break 4-1 and you guess wrong. There again, crossing in diamonds doesn't feel so great either, as [at least] two rounds of diamonds have to stand up for that line to work. Not an easy one.

If you tried to cross in clubs, hard luck — you're down, as West ruffs the first round. Suzanne correctly decided that diamonds were the better bet, and played ♦AK and a third diamond, East following with ♦4, ♦10 and ♦Q. Do the diamonds break 3-3 or 4-2? Can you afford to ruff high to avoid a possible over-ruff or will this promote a trump trick for the defence? Decision time again...

As the cards lie, this is the one decision declarer can't get wrong on this board! The spade and diamond suits both behave, to make up for the other two suits. Click on Show All Hands to see the detail.

Suzanne ruffed (high, I think), drew trumps and claimed. Phew!

Some points of interest on the deal:

• West did well to find the heart lead. On a diamond lead, 6♠ is probably a much easier make... declarer runs the ♠10 at trick 2 and can't go wrong if West wins with ♠K and tries for a heart ruff (a trick too late).
• What do you think of the 3♥ bid by West? Overcalling light when vulnerable is not for the faint-hearted, and EW risk being doubled and going for a massive penalty (4♣ works out no better for EW than 3♥). But on the other hand, the opposition intervention makes life quite difficult for NS to bid the slam and it's not easy for them to find a penalty double, as the bidding went.
• Would declarer have made the slam with no opposition bidding? Almost certainly not, on an innocuous heart lead! At the table, declarer was tipped off about the risk of defensive ruffs in clubs and hearts by the bidding. But if the opposition had passed throughout, I'd expect Suzanne to have [very unluckily] gone two down, as she'd probably have run the ♠10 at trick 2, and the defence can now score both a heart and a club ruff when she takes the losing trump finesse, which is the obvious line. Ouch!
• Most important of all — good declarer play often starts with the bidding. Listen to the bidding and use all the clues to help you work out the likely distribution.

On this occasion, Suzanne fully deserved my comment of "Well played, partner".

Dave Simmons
February 2020

a) Suzanne faced this tricky problem on board 27 in the Teams event: how to make 12 tricks after her partner leapt straight to 6♥ with an unscientific / wildly optimistic bid [you decide].

South may well have ♠Kx and ♥KJx for his double, in which case there are two inescapable losers and there's nothing to be done. But there are other possibilities in the trump suit. For example South may be void, just have ♥Kx or even a singleton ♥K (the latter is by far the most unlikely, after the double).

After some thought, declarer decided to take the double at face value, showing values in trumps rather than a shortage. She won the lead in hand with ♦A, crossed to dummy with a club ruff and led ♥Q, planning to run it if South ducked. This would have been a spectacular success if the layout had been ♥Kx with South and ♥J singleton with North — the slam would then make even if the ♠K was offside. At the table, South covered the heart lead (the play going ♥Q, ♥K and ♥A)... but North showed out, alas. So there was still an inescapable trump loser.

All that remained was for declarer to force out ♥J, draw the remaining trump, and with a resigned shrug run the ♠J to take the unavoidable spade finesse... 11 or 12 tricks depending on who had the ♠K.

Phew, the ♠J held. After a second spade finesse, the claim from declarer quickly followed — the 6♥ doubled slam had just made. Even non-vulnerable this scored a very handy 1020 points and a swing of 15 IMPs on the night. Very well played by Suzanne... I knew I should have redoubled.

Click on Show All Hands to confirm the actual holdings. Be honest, as declarer wouldn't you have just banged out ♥A and moaned about your bad luck when the trumps broke 3-0 with ♥KJx sitting over dummy's ♥Q10xxxx. For that matter, if you'd been sitting South, wouldn't you have doubled the slam with that holding of ♣AKxx ♦KQxx ♥KJ3 ♠xx sitting over a Michaels cue bid in a 6♥ contract.

But at Teams you should be aware that doubling a slam is not advisable. Suppose the slam goes one down, non-vulnerable... you gain an extra 50 points; whereas if it makes, declarer makes an extra 230 points (1210 instead of 980).  Odds of roughly 5-1 against the double paying off. And how likely is a freely-bid slam likely to go more than one down... "not very" must be the answer.

In fact, a penalty double can potentially cost a lot more than that. Suppose that the double alerts declarer to a bad trump break, or gives declarer a clue to the winning line. If they now make a contract that would have gone down if passed out quietly, then the loss is in fact 1210 against a gain of 50 (more like odds of 15-1 rather than the original 5-1 by the time you've converted to IMPs). Were you really that confident you'd defeat the slam?

Think of it as the Grand National: would you put £100 on the favourite to win at odds of 15-1 on? The answer to that question must surely be "Not bloomin' likely"! So on the same basis, don't double a slam at Teams just because you think it's quite probable it will go down, there's a lot to lose and very little to gain.

b) The contract is now 5♥ (doubled), so 11 tricks is the target rather than the 12 tricks required above. 

From the bidding, the lead and the [confident] double South could have as much as ♦KQx, ♣AKJ, ♠Kx and ♥KJ(x).  Of course, South's minor suit honours are worthless as ithe cards lie (this contract must have been bid on distribution, not high-card points, but South was aware of that risk when they doubled). However, you are still facing two or three losers in the majors and the difference between making 10 tricks and making 11 tricks in 5♥ doubled is, well... a lot of IMPs!

You can't do anything about ♠K if it's offside but the contract is still an easy make if trumps break 2-1, losing just one trick each in hearts and spades. However, after the double, there's a strong suggestion that North has all three trumps (equally, it just might be South). Success in this contract boils down to restricting your trump losers to just one trick, even if one defender holds ♥KJx on the worst case 3-0 trump break. Can you cater for either North or South being void in trumps?

Yes! An opportunity now arises for you to demonstrate your expertise in safety play, as Brian pointed out to me a couple of days later (annoyed at missing it himself on the night, though it only cost him an overtrick). Just win the opening lead with ♦A, and lead a low heart towards the ♥Q, which is the "standard" safety play with this sort of holding in the trump suit.

When North follows with a low heart, simply cover it. If South now shows out... fine; and if not, trumps are breaking 2-1 so there's no problem either. Of course, if North shows out on the first trump lead (as expected, after South's double), go up with the ♥Q and take the marked trump finesse the other way when you regain the lead. So on any layout, there's only one trump loser, and you have guaranteed making eleven tricks in 5♥ doubled for a great score. You even have the added luxury of taking the spade finesse for a doubled overtrick.

This is the essence of any safety play — you deliberately ignore the chance of making the maximum number of tricks on a favourable lie, but guarantee making your contract on an unfavourable lie (which may often be very much against the odds... in bridge quizzes, at least). This is the reason why the need for safety plays crops up with much less frequency at Pairs (ie MP scoring) than at Teams (IMP scoring).

In fact, as Saroj pointed out to me after reading an earlier draft, declarer even has the opportunity for a classic "discovery play" playing for 12 tricks in 6♥ — they can take an early spade finesse to discover how many trump losers they can afford, and either play for the ♥K to drop singleton or play safe in trumps for one loser.

What a fascinating hand to analyse at leisure, but declarer had to get it right at the table, of course.
 

Dave Simmons
October 2019

Postscript: I sent this deal to Andrew Robson for possible inclusion in his column.  He replied as follows:

Thanks very much Dave, yes, I'll be writing a column on this fine deal, thank you. I do like your bidding - the other thing you could have done is bid 5C over 4H as a slam try with a club void. If [West's] ace was clubs not diamonds, she could sign off in 5H. Very well done. And yes, I do think an early spade finesse is the indicated play, so you know how to play hearts.

Your best chance of avoiding a heart loser is to cash the ace, succeeding when the king is singleton either side. The alternative of running dummy's queen wins only when specifically West holds a singleton jack, half as likely.

However, cashing the ace of hearts will not be so clever if East holds ♥KJx, as you will lose two tricks. You can be sure of avoiding two heart losers by leading low towards dummy, or (slightly better because you avoid a loser entirely when East holds a singleton king), lead low from dummy and cover East's card.

Because the way to tackle hearts varies according to how many heart tricks you can afford to lose, you should take the spade finesse at trick two. You win the ace of diamonds and lead a spade to the queen (or run the jack).

When the queen of spades wins, you know you can afford a heart loser. At trick three, you lead the two of hearts and, when East plays the three, you in turn cover with the four, earning style points for winning the first round of trumps with the four, when West discards.  [ Click on Show All Hands to reveal the East-West cards. ]

You can now cash the ace of hearts and set up spades, crossing to the ace (in case East forgot to win the king last time), ruffing a third spade and conceding only the king of hearts. Slam made. 

(C) Andrew Robson, 2020

a) Lead ♥K.

The defence has found a good attacking lead. You draw trumps in two rounds, but you're still faced with the immediate loss of a heart if you lose the lead again.

The diamond suit looks good for a potential discard of your heart loser, so do you take an immediate diamond finesse, hoping North has the ♦K, or cash ♦A and take a ruffing finesse the other way, hoping that South has the ♦K. On the face of it, this looks like a 50% guess (though the bidding would suggest that South is more likely to hold the king)... do you mentally toss a coin?

No... there's a certain way of making the 6♣ slam on this layout, regardless of who has the ♦K. You must take the ruffing finesse against South's presumed king, and simply discard your losing heart if South doesn't cover your diamond. Even if North has ♦K and the ruffing finesse loses, North can no longer cash a heart winner, and there are still two master diamonds in dummy on which to discard declarer's potentially losing spades. The ruffing finesse is a win-win play!

So to sum up — in this case, the ruffing finesse is superior for two reasons:
i) the contract is not immediately defeated if the finesse fails, and 
ii) the ruffing finesse establishes two further winners for discards, even if it does fail.
 

b) Lead ♠9.

Things are now rather trickier... for starters, you need to decide whether to take an immediate spade finesse or go straight up with dummy's ♠A. Well, ♠9 looks rather like  doubleton lead from ♠9x, but could be a singleton ♠9. The fact that North has shown long hearts with his pre-empt suggest that a singleton lead is more likely. But North could be bluffing, or simply have made an unorthodox lead from ♠K9x (there's no law against it)?!

If you decided to play low, unlucky. South wins the ♠K and returns a spade, ruffed by North... for an immediate one down!

But even if you go up with ♠A, you're not out of the woods yet. You can take a ruffing finesse in diamonds as above, but if North has ♦K, you could still be one down just the same, as North is bound to return a second spade if he has one. It's a risk you have to take.

You run ♦Q with fingers crossed. If South covers with his ♦K, your problems are over. You ruff and cross to dummy, discarding your two spade losers on the established diamonds. You now have the luxury of running the ♠Q as a second ruffing finesse, planning to discard your remaining heart loser if it is not covered, for an overtrick.

Assuming you have sufficient entries to dummy, the defence is helpless. Whether the defender covers or not, both ruffing finesses work (as the cards lie) and declarer can return to dummy to discard the remaining loser(s) on established winners. On this line, declarer can make all thirteen tricks, for a spectacular top in a 6♣ slam.

By the way, did you spot the need to retain a third low trump in the West hand as an entry to dummy when ruffing away South's winners? "Nice try, but no cigar" if you didn't. In the excitement of playing a slam, it's easy to miss this sort of crucial detail. Click on Show All Hands and "Play it again" to check out the various lines for yourself.

Tip: When you have trumps to spare, it's good technique to retain a low trump in the long hand when drawing trumps, to keep your entry options open. In this case, you can create an additional entry to dummy by crossing to ♣9 on the third round of trumps using that low trump that you carefully preserved earlier.

At the table, three pairs were in 6♣, going down twice and making once. One bold pair bid to an optimistic grand slam in 7♣, missing three kings. They also went one down, but had the dubious satisfaction of at least making twelve tricks for their joint bottom!

Oh yes... and at our table, the bidding didn't quite go along the suggested lines.
We defended 3♥ doubled — please don't ask — which was just one down for a meagre 200 penalty (with game and slam on the other way), but still scored a very undeserved middle on the board!

Dave Simmons
August 2019

At my table, South decided not to raise my 1♦ overcall despite his good 4-card support — many would raise pre-emptively to 3♦, the level of the fit, especially at favourable vulnerability. But this hand of the month is about defensive play, not bidding.

So... what to lead? Partner knows I am expecting a diamond lead after my overcall. But there again, so is declarer, who clearly has at least one good stopper in diamonds or he'd not have bid a confident 3NT. He's likely to have at least ♦Kx or ♦QJx, maybe even ♦KJx or ♦AJx which South can see would be a double stopper, from his holding in diamonds.

But a lead from South's unbid heart suit also looks tempting, so long as partner has an honour. The clock's running... it's decision time. A diamond or a heart; predictable lead or sneak-attack? Either lead could result in triumph or disaster, especially at Butler Pairs where a vulnerable game swing often costs 13 IMPs one way or the other.

My partner on the night (Ron Raine) came up with the ♥J lead, and dummy went down with ♥Q42. This lead was ducked all round, and partner continued with ♥10, ducked again in dummy by declarer. By now, I was pretty certain that partner must have led from ♥KJ10 rather than ♥J109, so I overtook with ♥A and returned my third heart. Sure enough, partner won with ♥K and cashed his fourth heart.

On the fourth heart, I have the luxury of signalling for a diamond (though this is hardly necessary after my overcall). Sure enough, a diamond switch follows, I win with ♦A and we've taken the first five tricks for one down, declarer claiming the rest. There's nothing declarer could have done, and he'd given himself the best chance by ducking the heart lead twice in dummy, as the defence could easily block the suit if they're not careful.

Have a look at the full deal by clicking how Show All Hands. Note that on the "obvious" diamond lead and continuation by the defence, declarer would wrap up the next eleven tricks without even breaking sweat.

An inspired lead and solid defence got us a good score on the board. 3NT-1 scored 100 for us, 3NT+2 would have scored 660 for them — a swing of 13 IMPs.

Looking at the traveller, others are in 4♠ on a 4-3 fit (possibly put off the 3NT contract by a diamond barrage from the opposition) and 5♣ (minor suit games are always more acceptable at Butler scoring). As it happens, all three games can be defeated double-dummy... try "Play it again" if you don't believe me. But at the table, both 4♠ and 5♣ are likely to make, as the defence may find it difficult to find the required heart switch after a probable diamond lead.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that ♥J is necessarily a better lead than a diamond against 3NT (though it certainly worked out that way on the night). To be honest, I'd rate this as a difficult choice of lead. What I am saying is that you should always think hard about the bidding before making your lead, and consider what partner and declarer might have for their bids. Don't just assume that leading partner's suit is best (if he's bid), or that fourth-highest from your longest and strongest is best (if he hasn't). Often is is, but not always... who said bridge was an easy game?!

The only thing that's certain (other than death and taxes) is that if you do decide to go for imaginative leads you will need a tolerant partner when they backfire (as they inevitably will, on occasion). Butler Pairs encourages this "high-risk" approach to defence, as there's little merit in just preventing declarer making overtricks with "safe" leads... the emphasis when defending at IMP scoring is to go all out to defeat the contract.

For many, this makes Butler Pairs both more exciting and more relaxing than the usual Pairs MP scoring, where safe leads are often the order of the day, and defenders must agonise over almost every lead or switch, in case it costs an expensive overtrick.
 

Dave Simmons
June 2019

Well, every single bid has an impact on subsequent bidding, so it's impossible to cover all permutations of the bidding.  But here's a few of the main sequences:

1. Unopposed bidding

Let's start on the assumption that South opens the bidding after three passes. The grand slam is not at all easy to bid, but here's one way it might be reached:

a) Pass  Pass  Pass  1♣
    Pass   1♦    Pass  3♠
    Pass   4♦    Pass  4NT
    Pass   5♦    Pass  7♣ (?)

The double jump to 3♠ is a splinter bid: a game force, usually showing a great fit — but not here — and always showing a shortage in the bid suit (a singleton or void). Once North rebids diamonds, South gambles on Blackwood (hoping to hear "two aces" and dreading to hear "no aces"), but when North's response shows "one ace" (phew), South has a reasonable case to gamble on the grand slam... after all, you don't get dealt a two-loser hand every day! But the prudent course might still be to settle for the small slam in 6♣ at that point (as going one down in the grand slam will surely be a bottom at Match-Point scoring).

Now suppose that North opens 1♦ (this is how Alan & Saroj bid the grand slam on the night):

b) Pass  1♦  Pass  2♣
    Pass  2♦  Pass  4NT
    Pass  5♦  Pass  7♣ 

Whether you think North has the values for a vulnerable 1♦ opener is largely down to individual style and judgement. It wouldn't be my choice to be honest, but is a spectacular winner on the night.

In this sequence, after North has bid and rebid diamonds South has a much better case for bidding Blackwood — and subsequently risking the grand slam once partner shows up with one ace. All it takes for thirteen tricks to be laydown is for partner to have "the right ace" (♦A) and either ♦Q or ♥Qxx as part of their opening bid (all very much odds-on after North has rebid diamonds).

Note that in neither of the above sequences does South need to make wild jumps in clubs on the first round. Any forcing bid will do, eg a simple change of suit. All that an immediate 5♣ or 6♣ is likely to achieve is to shut up partner!

2. Interference

So far, we have assumed that East-West pass throughout... which is purely down to system and style. Many at Royston still (somewhat surprisingly, to my mind) favour the "old-fashioned" Acol style of bidding: strong-twos and intermediate/strong jump overcalls. Almost all modern teachers and experts (Bernard Magee, Andrew Robson and many more) recommend weak-two opening bids and weak jump overcalls (WJOs), on the grounds of both frequency and the disruption is usually causes to the opposition bidding.

Let's have a look how the bidding might start playing weak-twos:

c) Pass  Pass  2♠  Double
    4♠ ...

East has an automatic weak-two opener third-in-hand at favourable vulnerability, and South is probably best off to initially double (ostensibly for takeout, but — as here — it can also show a hand too strong for a simple overcall). Now West should continue the pre-emptive barrage with an immediate raise to 4♠ (raising to "the level of the fit" — EW have 10 spades between them, so bid to make 10 tricks).

The bidding is already at 4♠ but neither North nor South have even started to describe their hands. Now that's what I call a "result" for the weak-two!

And if North opens 1♦, the same situation results in much the same way, after just five bids:

d) Pass  1♦  2♠  3♠ 
    4♠ ...

This time, East's 2♠ is a WJO (roughly equivalent in strength and shape to an opening weak-two). South may perhaps try 3♠ at this point (clearly a game force, and typically showing a good fit in partner's suit... but not in this case). As before, West joins in the fun by raising immediately to 4♠.

My guess is that whatever North and East bid next, South will probably give up and settle for 6♣ with his next bid... and if he does bid 7♣ (?!) it is likely to be a pure gamble as he knows too little about partner's hand to bid it with any real confidence.

That's why pre-empts are successful tactics at bridge... they make the opposition guess. Even the world's best players guess wrong sometimes, and most club players guess wrong about 50% of the time.

So if you don't yet play weak-twos and WJOs, maybe you should think about switching. I don't guarantee it will always work out, but you'll definitely have more fun!
 

Dave Simmons
March 2019

You must be feeling pretty pleased with yourself for deciding to open 1♠ on a marginal ("rule of 19") opener when dummy goes down, as there look to be a certain twelve tricks in the 6♠ slam, with all thirteen if the club finesse comes off. So you put up dummy's ♣J and West wins with the ♣K. Back comes a club and the roof falls in... East ruffs the second round of clubs and you're one down. Click on Show All Hands to see the gory details.

Unlucky?!

Well, at Match-Point duplicate maybe. But at Butler Pairs (or Teams, or rubber bridge), you have only one consideration as declarer: how to make the contract... overtricks are irrelevant. When things look straightforward, consider what might go wrong.

As Martin realised too late (it was still obviously niggling him a week later), all he had to do was go up with the ♣A, draw trumps, unblock diamonds and concede a club (the losing heart can be discarded on a top diamond). So even if the club finesse works, there's no need to take it! Almost the only thing that can go wrong for North playing in 6♠ is a club ruff by East at trick 2.

So yes, it was unlucky, as (according to a bridge website), the a priori likelihood of East having a singleton club is only 7.5% (ie "pretty unlikely") But that's not the point... going up with ♣A is a safety play that caters perfectly well for this eventuality, and at Butler Pairs costs precisely nothing — now that's my favourite sort of safety play, a "no-lose" option(*).

On the night (at Butler Pairs) 6♠ making on the nail and 6♠ making with an overtrick would have scored exactly the same (+13 IMPS). Whereas 6♠-1 lost 13 IMPs, a massive swing of 26 IMPs on just one board. That's Butler Pairs for you!

Of course, the decision is more difficult at Match Point scoring, as 6♠+1 outscores 6♠ making 12 tricks (and 6NT just making, for that matter). It now requires guesswork and judgement as to whether you think the field will have bid the slam (and which slam). If you think "everyone" will be in the 6♠ slam then there's a case to be made for ignoring the safety play, "going with the field" and taking the club finesse for an overtrick. Whereas if you think you've done pretty well to even bid the slam (as is probably the case here), then you need to concentrate on making it... play safe for a top, regardless.

Martin Leach / Dave Simmons
February 2019
 

(*) Is going up with ♣A a no-lose option? Well, that's not entirely true. Suppose East has ♠J98x (so you have an unavoidable trump loser) and has also led away from the ♣K... now the club finesse is in fact the only way to make the contract.

Judgement is required. Is a 4-0 trump break more likely than a 5-1 club break? Does the lead look like a singleton? Would East lead from an unsupported King against a slam with a likely trump trick in the bag? I'd say on balance that going up with the ♣A is still the percentage play to make the slam, but it's not quite as clear cut as I've made out above.

Who said bridge was an easy game. 

Well, Bridgewebs Play it again shows that double-dummy defence will indeed defeat 3♣ by North, but it takes an unlikely trump lead to do so, and careful defence after that.

If you play the hand through, you will see that on a trump lead the defence can play three rounds of trumps before declarer can engineer a ruff of his second losing diamond in hand. So North ends up losing a spade, two hearts and two diamonds. This defence is pretty difficult to find — almost impossible at the table, especially on the bidding.

That's also why 3♣ by South would be unbeatable... simply because West doesn't have a trump to lead, even if he'd been tipped off beforehand!

Could we have done better? Well, only with the benefit of hindsight.

If East decides to respond 3♦, say, to my double, I'll correct to 3♠ which makes at least 9 tricks comfortably, for a middle (assuming that's the final contract). Indeed, 4♠ should make our way, despite the nasty 4-1 trump break, with a trump "elopement". Play it again demonstrates how this works, and also shows that declarer can even make an "impossible" 11 tricks in spades (using foreknowledge of the precise spade layout)... but that's just the computer showing off, and cheating!

This board was just one top that John & Colin got on the night... they managed another ten great scores in the other rounds (and no disasters), which explains how they ended up with a score of over 70%. Well done!

Dave Simmons
January 2019

The winning line is to play just one top trump and then duck a trump. That way, there's still a trump left in dummy to prevent the clubs running, but South is (fortunately) exhausted of trumps, so there's no longer a diamond ruff available. Declarer now loses just two trumps and a club on any return, as the cards lie.

This line isn't guaranteed to work, but is perhaps the best percentage line after the 3♣ pre-empt suggests North is likely to have length in hearts.

Don't worry if you didn't spot this line... neither did declarer on the night. And I had to cheat using Bridgewebs "Play it Again" to see how it could be done at all.

Dave Simmons

There are three fairly obvious alternatives: 3♥, 4♥ or perhaps an off-beat takeout double (intending to rebid 4♥ over the likely black suit response).

I felt that 3♥ was a bit feeble with my strong 6-card heart suit and was put off a double by my unbalanced shape. So I went for an immediate 4♥ , which was passed out.

This proved to be a disastrous decision as the cards lie, with West ruffing diamonds (click on Show All Hands), and I didn't particularly cover myself with glory in the play, managing to go four down on the first board of the night. Looking at the full deal, I'm sure many Wests would find it impossible to resist bidding their 8-card club suit on the first round (4♣ or 5♣ according to taste). The bidding would then be entirely different... which probably explains the spectacular mix of outcomes ranging all the way from +1100 to -600.

So what's this got to do with bridge mantras, I hear you ask? Well, one of the world's top players (Bob Hamman) has advice for the very situation that North faces here: "If you have a choice of reasonable bids and one of them is 3NT, then bid it".

It certainly crossed my mind to bid 3NT at the table as the heart suit may well run for 6 tricks, whether hearts are trumps or not. But I reluctantly chickened out — yes, 3NT does go just the SIX down on a club lead, as West pointed out at the table when I mentioned No Trumps afterwards... but is East likely to find the killing lead of ♣A against 3NT on that bidding, when a diamond lead is likely to defeat the contract by force if partner has one of the missing diamond honours? On an orthodox ♦Q lead, I would have had an easy eight tricks off the top. That's just one down, which would certainly beat the outcome in 4♥ on the night, though still not a great score.

In practice, this discussion of the merits of 3NT as a final contract is completely academic, as the bid works well for an entirely different (and unexpected) reason. My partner would certainly have rescued the doomed 3NT into a cast-iron 4♠ and then we stand at least a chance of a top on the board, depending on West's next bid (surely 5♣).

Either way, I'll follow my instinct next time and bid 3NT.

Dave Simmons

One glance at dummy explained East's reluctance to bid on, and I counted four probable losers... two black aces and two red kings.

I ruffed the second club and without much further thought led ♦Q in an attempt to force an entry to dummy. South won with ♦K and returned a spade. I tried running that to dummy's ♠10 but North won with ♠A and returned a spade. I was about to cross to dummy with a diamond to take the trump finesse when I spotted two possible flaws with this line... if the diamonds break 4-1 the second diamond will be ruffed, and even if they break 3-2, I'm still quite likely to experience a ruff in diamonds or spades, if the ♥K is offside.

Judging that 3♥ making might well be a good score — the hand had not been an easy one to bid — I decided to minimise the risks of a ruff by banging out ♥A and ♥Q.

If I'd thought a bit harder, I may have decided to lead out the queen of hearts at trick 3 instead of the queen of diamonds. That way I still lose one trick to a red king, but can now draw trumps ending in dummy and take the diamond finesse with no fear of a ruff if it fails. I made another mistake a trick later — I should rise with a top spade, which would have been much more likely to force an entry to dummy with ♠10.

I spotted an even better line the next day... if I lead a deceptive low spade at trick 2, North may well duck with ♠A, enabling me to sneak an extra entry to dummy with that ♠10. That gives me a choice of finesses in the red suits. Hindsight is a wonderful thing!

When the provisional rankings came up on the club laptop, it was a blanket finish with the top three pairs within a whisker of each other, all on well over 60%. But the scorer soon noticed that there were still five scores to be received, as the Bridgemate system seemed to have gone on strike during the final round!

Once the missing scores were retrieved from deep within the system, it was well past midnight, but a glance at the ranking confirmed that we were in third place. That final board had not been good for us. In fact 3♥= was a near bottom, whereas 3♥+1 would have scored above average... well enough to reverse the position of the top three pairs in the ranking!

What's the moral of all this? Well in fact there are two:

At Match Point scoring, every trick counts and every board is of equal importance. Missing the overtrick on this board was just as expensive for us as our failure to bid the grand slam on board 4.

The second moral?  Well, Andrew Robson (arguably England's top living bridge player) has provided a huge amount of useful advice and tips for aspiring club players over the years, but none more valuable to my mind than this seemingly mundane tip in his series on Pairs Tactics in English Bridge (February 2011), applicable to players of every level:

"Concentrate especially hard on the first and last boards of a session"... if only I'd remembered this advice on Thursday. Sorry, partner!

Dave Simmons

Well, most of us would surely pass in a flash, but not my intrepid partner! She "went into the tank" and eventually came up with the bid of 5♠, or should I say 5♠?! — for those unfamiliar with the chess notation, the "?!" is shorthand for "good, bad or just a bit crazy... who knows".

Clearly, 5♠ is likely to go several down doubled, maybe a lot worse than that. But there again, it is favourable vulnerability, so three down doubled will show a small profit over a making game by NS (so the sacrifice may be worthwhile at IMP scoring).

Click on Show All Hands, and you will see that East was "rewarded" with horrible breaks in both black suits. Unsurprisingly, North doubled, so the contract ended up as 5♠ doubled, by East.

In fact, on double-dummy lines, this does indeed go four down for a score of -800, and in practice might well go down by more than that if declarer panics and loses trump control. At the table, South led out ♥A, ♦A and a club (which was ruffed by North). At this point I was fearing a penalty of massive proportions, but in fact it's now fairly straightforward for East to escape for just three down, only losing one more trick in each of the black suits. East may well have felt that they got out of jail on that one!

Interestingly, NS can make 12 tricks in hearts, so in theory, a non-vulnerable sacrifice in 6♠ (just the SIX down, doubled) would still show a profit over a 6♥ vulnerable slam, scoring minus 1400 as opposed to minus 1430, ie plus 30 points or one very hard-earned IMP! But please don't try this at home, children. 

In practice, only one NS pair managed to bid and make the slam on a combined 25 points — hardly surprising — very well done to them. And not only does the slam make but would make exactly the same 12 tricks without NS holding any black suit honours at all... on a mere 18-count. Which shows that in bridge, it's often shape that counts as much as points on these big hands.

Here's the likely play in 6♥ by South: West may well kick off with ♠A and another spade, which makes life very easy for declarer. However the lead of ♣10 would not be so favourable, and declarer now has to find the ♦Q to make 12 tricks. If East has bid aggressively showing a black 2-suiter, they are very likely to be short in diamonds, and declarer should finesse accordingly. Otherwise, it's a two-way guess for the queen. On a good day, the slam makes with 5 trumps, 3 ruffs and 4 diamonds, losing just one spade trick.

Dave Simmons
January 2018

Well, a glance at dummy and it's obvious you need to rely on the ♦K being onside... a 50% chance.

But first things first, how do you play the trump suit?

If the clubs break 2-1, there's no problem, so why not consider a 3-0 break for a few moments. This will be no problem, so long as you can guess which opponent is more likely to have ♣Qxx.

At the table, I decided there was very little in it, on the bidding: South's overcall suggesting that a shortage in clubs was more likely, whereas a count of points suggesting that South would be very light for their vulnerable 1♠ overcall without the ♣Q (nine points at most, and a spade suit missing ♠AK).

With my mind already half on the diamond finesse, I decided to ruff the spade lead in hand and play a low club to dummy's ace. 

Disaster! South showed out, and I was left with an unavoidable trump loser. My mood wasn't improved by subsequently discovering that the diamond finesse worked, so I'd missed a makeable grand slam.

On reflection, a better line is to win the opening lead in dummy, and lead the ♣J, hoping to tempt a cover from a defender with ♣Qxx who may have touching faith in that old adage "Cover an honour with an honour"! If South plays low, you intend to go up with the ♣K anyway, but it is a "no-lose" play.

As the cards lie, this line hits the jackpot for an entirely different reason. South shows out, and it's now easy to pick up North's ♣Q by taking the marked finesse in trumps the other way.

After drawing trumps, you then lead the ♦Q for another finesse, and you're in luck... the ♦K is onside. I was kicking myself for days at not making that grand slam, for a top.

Interestingly, the traveller revealed that three pairs were in the inferior 6♦ slam, and one pair in a distinctly uncomfortable 6NT contract.

However, the defence to both 6♦ and 6NT reveals that sometimes "Cover an honour with an honour" can be very good advice. When declarer leads the ♦Q from dummy, covering with the ♦K ensures that declarer has a loser in the suit, whereas ducking lets declarer get away with no losers in diamonds. Given that two declarers made all 13 tricks in 6♦ it would seem that the defence got it wrong at least twice.

So what's the difference, you may ask. Why is it right to cover the ♦Q with ♦Kx in a 6♦ slam but wrong to cover the ♣J with ♣Qxx in a 7♣ slam?

Well, there's no quick answer to that, the depressing truth is that the advice to "cover an honour with an honour" is one of the most misleading pieces of bridge advice ever, wrong almost as often as it's right. The subject is well covered by Victor Mollo and Nico Gardner in their book "Card Play Technique", which still features in many experts' top 10 list of bridge books, despite being written over half a century ago. But in a nutshell:

a) It's right to cover the ♦Q, because that's your only chance to take a diamond honour with your ♦K. Declarer is bound to run the ♦Q and lead a second diamond if you don't cover. Whereas...
b) It's wrong to cover the ♣J because the Jack is the higher of touching honours, and anyway your partner can't possibly have a club to promote by covering (on the bidding, he can have at most a singleton club).

In other words, glib bridge mantras don't always help. And to make it worse, when it comes to covering it's often just as bad to make the right decision after an agonised huddle as to make the wrong decision smoothly. On this occasion, you need to think, preferably in advance.

So who said bridge was an easy game?!
 

Dave Simmons
December 2017

a) The bidding question is all about "system". The title of this month's hand rather gives it away... sorry!

Open 2♦ if your system allows (which rather rules out Acol strong-twos and Benji, for starters).

Nowadays, many club bridge players prefer to play three weak-twos rather than the traditional Acol strong-twos, the popular Benji Acol, or even the unspeakable Multi-2♦. So it was relatively easy for such pairs to open 2♦ with that South hand, announced as "Weak".  After a 3♦ raise by North (pre-emptive, not encouraging), East made a no-nonsense 4♠ overcall at our table, to end the bidding as follows: 

2♦  Pass  3♦  4♠

Note that South is quite right to open a weak-two even with a rather feeble suit consisting of ♦J1098xx. That's a perfectly sound weak-two at favourable vulnerability, where pretty much "anything goes" (at least, that's the way I like to play it). Weak-twos are often more pre-emptive than lead-directing. On this occasion, the weak-two opener did its job and shut out West from opening the bidding, and East-West then had little chance of finding the slam.
 

b) So what do you lead against the slam after the alternative East-West bidding shown here:

1♥ – 2♠ – 3♣ – 4NT – 5♥ – 6♠ 

There are two main schools of thought about leading your ace against a slam... Always or Never!  A radical third alternative is to consider the bidding first, then select your lead.

This time, you don't even need to think about the bidding to know that declarer is missing an ace, as it's staring you in the face. However, with hearts bid on your left, a ♥A lead from ♥AQx seems pretty risky, as it could easily cost the slam if declarer has the ♥K, rather than dummy. It  could also set up the entire suit for declarer at trick one (suppose dummy goes down with ♥KJxxx and declarer holds ♥xx). Better alternatives may be a top diamond (the unbid suit, and safe as houses), your singleton club (futile here, but the obvious choice if you didn't have that side ace) or an ultra-passive trump lead (and if that was your choice of lead against this slam, perhaps you should eat more Weetabix).

The ♦J would have been my choice, but what do I know?! On the night, the ♥A lead is the big winner, as you can see. Dummy's hand goes down revealing hearts as the slam's obvious weakness, so a second heart follows inevitably, not even requiring an attitude signal from partner, who (conveniently for the defence) holds the ♥K. One down.

Three pairs out of seven bid the slam on the night, and two out of three made it easily enough. So commiserations to the pair who went for the slam but were the only East-West pair to get the heart lead, by the look of it. They lost 12 IMPs on the deal, but on any other lead there's 12 tricks off the top for a score of +10 IMPs, a swing of a mere 22 IMPs for that pair, on just a single board.

But that's bridge (and in particular, Butler Pairs), love it or hate it.
 

Dave Simmons

I toyed with leading my singleton ♣K, but that seemed pretty risky, even at Teams. After all, South may well have ♣A and leading my ♣K might save him taking a losing finesse. So I decided to lead the "obvious" ♦A hoping to have a look at dummy first. It was quite possible that a diamond continuation could well lead to an over-ruff or a trump promotion if North and East were equally short in diamonds.

Big mistake! As the cards lie, the lead of the ♣K was the only lead to defeat 4♥.

Click on Show All Hands to reveal all. If I could have seen dummy before leading (as in "Mini-bridge"), I suspect I'd have been even less likely to lead the ♣K as it looks favourite to cost a trick with ♣QJ in dummy.

Back to the play. Declarer ruffed in dummy, crossed to ♥A and led a "sneaky" ♦10 (a ruffing finesse), which held the trick after I ducked. He continued with ♦J which I covered, ruffed with dummy's ♥6 (oops) and over-ruffed with partner's ♥7. Declarer was now expecting the worst — the defence must surely cash their three black suit winners for one down. But no, the club suit was blocked.

The defence can in fact still defeat the contract at this point — East needs to make the unlikely play of underleading ♣A but understandably cashed the ♣A instead (crashing my singleton ♣ K) and then had little choice but to lead a second club, hoping for a ruff. No luck there either, as I am out of trumps at this point. So declarer got out of jail by scraping home in 4♥ doubled for a good score of 10 IMPs to NS. On the other hand, 4♥ going one down doubled would have scored 5 IMPs to EW, so there was a net swing of 15 IMPs on just that one board.

This is a good hand to use Bridgewebs "Play it again" to investigate the various lines. Double-dummy, you'll discover that declarer can even make an overtrick in 4♥  on the lead of ♦A, but only by relying on the clubs being blocked on that 6-1 break, which is hardly a percentage line, to put it mildly!

Back to the bidding. Looking at the four hands, 5♦ is an unlucky one down on that horrible 4-0 trump break (inevitably doubled by South). And 4♥ can be defeated, but only if I lead the singleton ♣K. So technically, the "par" contract on this deal is 4♥x-1 by NS, but that's with the benefit of double-dummy bidding and play! In the real world, 5♦x-1W is a much more likely outcome.

On the night, most EW pairs played in diamond contracts ranging all the way from 2♦+1 to 5♦x-1. So that was one of many big swing hands on the night, and one I would probably have enjoyed more as a spectator on BBO. It would have been good to watch the likes of Andrew Robson grappling with that bidding dilemma, or Zia finding the killing lead.

It's always so much easier when you can see all four hands!

Dave Simmons

In this case, leading a low diamond from your suit headed by the ♦KJ defeats the contract, whereas leading out one of your aces gifts declarer the eleventh trick. Click on Show All Hands to confirm.

But maybe this is no surprise to you, as leading an unsupported ace against a suit contract is deemed to be the worst possible lead you can make — even worse than leading away from an unsupported king. So on this occasion, it's not so much a case of picking the best lead, but selecting the "least worst" option, which often seems to be the case in real life... when I'm on lead anyway!

This Hand of the Month is all about choice of lead, and BridgeWebs has a wonderful tool to analyse this (and much more besides), namely "Play it again". If you are unfamiliar with how to use this amazing piece of software, instructions can be found under Documents on the club website, and the article just happens to use this very deal as an example.

The traveller shows that seven East-West pairs were in a club contract, making 10 tricks (five times) and 11 tricks (twice). Declarer was West on four of these occasions and East on three. Using "Play it again" it is easy to confirm that it takes a diamond lead from South or a red suit lead from North to defeat 5♣, and that 3NT played by East is impregnable.

Wouldn't it be nice to see what lead was made each time, so we could make an educated guess as to the influence of the opening lead on the eventual success (or otherwise) of the contract. Well, in fact there's a very simple mechanism to do this...

Just capture the lead on the Bridgemate! 

Perhaps I'll raise this with the committee for consideration soon.

Dave Simmons

Well, applying the SQOT to a suit of ♠AKQx arrives at the answer 4+3 = 7, so on that basis it would be considered acceptable to overcall 1♠ with such a suit.

At our table, that's exactly what East did. Click on Show All Hands, and see just how effective this bid turned out to be.

With no stopper in spades, NS were scared off the 3NT contract (which is laydown as the cards lie, with spades breaking 4-4). Instead, we bid to a game contract of 5♦, sensibly deciding against the minor suit slam on this occasion with two known losers off the top in spades.

At the time, this felt like good and accurate bidding, so imagine my surprise when I looked at the traveller the next day and discovered that this outcome scored poorly. In fact, it could easily have been an outright bottom!

The explanation was simple... most Easts had passed with that hand. South then ends up declarer in 3NT or 5♦, and without the spade overcall by East, there is no obvious reason for West to lead a spade. On the lead of any other suit, South has an easy 12 tricks in NT, or all 13 tricks in diamonds. A contract of 5♦ (just making) comes a poor third behind those other two outcomes. So on this occasion, the deal was a triumph for advocates of the SQOT.

The big benefit of overcalling a risky 1♠ on this occasion was mainly its lead-directing qualities, without which partner would be in the dark if they end up on lead to a contract by South.

However, I wouldn't recommend overcalling 1♠ on a suit such as ♠QJ10x, which passes the SQOT for a 1♠ overcall just as much as ♠AKQx. This demonstrates that aids to bidding such as the SQOT need to be taken with a pinch of salt, or a large dose of common sense if you prefer.
 

Dave Simmons

I reasoned as follows: assuming I can pick up the clubs without loss (which looks quite likely on the bidding), I have 7 tricks off the top and the choice of hearts or spades to look for the extra tricks required.

If the spade finesse loses to the ♠Q, another diamond will come straight back and I'll be facing almost certain defeat. And after West's weak-two in hearts and East's failure to lead a heart, the hearts must surely be breaking 6-0. So I have three certain tricks in hearts, provided I lead up to my hand twice and cover whatever card West plays.

That looks good, so I lead a heart at trick 2 and confidently play the ♥7 when West plays low.

Disaster! East wins with the ♥J and returns a second diamond. I can still cash 8 tricks, but the minute I lose the lead, the defence take the rest... one down.

I've been mugged by a weak-two bid on a 5-card suit, and a pretty weak one at that (see Show All Hands for the gory details). I should know better... at favourable vulnerability, the modern aggressive style in top circles is to bid on next to nothing, especially third in hand.

At other tables where perhaps East opens 3♦ and West certainly doesn't open 2♥, declarer is likely to rely on a simple spade finesse for the extra tricks, and make 11 tricks without breaking sweat. So everyone else is making overtricks in 3NT or 4♠, whereas I'm making a miserable 3NT-1 for a bottom.

I'd rate the defence at my table as follows:

East's decision not to open 3♦... brilliant (!)
West's decision to open an ultra-light 2♥ third in hand... brilliant (!!)
East's decision to lead a diamond rather than his singleton ♥J... brilliant (!!!)

As Robert Schumann said in somewhat different circumstances, "Hats off, gentleman, a genius"... or in this case, perhaps two. So look out for Chan and Quek, England stars of the future?!

Dave Simmons  December 2016

With the unsurprising ace of Spades lead the contract was quickly made. Partner’s comment after was 'You can only make that bid when you are missing a specific ace'.

Rules have to broken sometimes ….. :) They don’t cover all cases.

The other results for the hand: 2 were in 7 hearts (opening 2 clubs?), 3 others in 6 hearts, 1 not in game, another in 5 hearts and finally a brave soul in 5 spades.

Don't be afraid to engage brain before picking out one of those cards from the bidding box.... :)

Author’s name witheld, by their request.

I justified my 2♥ overcall as I do have 5 of them and it might give my partner a direction as to what to lead.

It so happened that our score ended up 50/50. But from the other scores on the hand, both EW & NS could have done better:-

The hand was played 8 times and, from the Dealmaster, E/W can make 3♠.  From the results, 4♠ was made 4 times although bid only once. N/S played the hand twice in 2♥  and once in 4♦  - which only went one off, giving N/S a clear top.

I’d like to suggest an alternative set of bids if you don’t use Multi 2♦.

                                  1S                   Dbl (1)            2H

            3D (2)           All pass

1. I can support any of the other 3 suits – just about
2. Maybe a bit optimistic particularly as we’re vulnerable

Perhaps this is how Dave & Roger got to 4♦  but they are quite assertive bidders.  Whenever Ron & I see we’re playing them next, I always say, quietly, “We will not be mugged.” – but often are.

Malcolm Dean

With a hand worth absolutely nothing in defence but worth 7 or 8 playing tricks with spades as trumps, West made the sensible decision of taking out the penalty double and saving in 5♠. But she did look slightly anxious when I doubled in turn, without hesitation.

For those pairs who still play Acol strong-twos, the bidding is essentially the same. South will pass, West will open 4♠ and the subsequent bidding could well go as before, except that North can now only bid 5♦ as he has no way of knowing about their 9-card heart fit. East is now even better value for a penalty double, expecting to make at least four tricks if partner has ♠A, but West should still take-out the double, as before.

Now for the play:

I kicked off with ♣9, and dummy went down with ♣AQJ106, so some declarers might be tempted by the finesse. But West was up to the challenge and went straight up with ♣A — the club lead looks like an obvious singleton from the bidding (otherwise, surely a heart lead would have been chosen).

Now a small trump from dummy, covered by the ♠Q, ♠K and ♠A. Phew, relief for declarer who was probably fearing the worst, with ♠AQ on her left. So that's trumps almost cleared for only one loser.

Now I'm on lead again, as North. How irritating... I want my partner to be on lead so that he can give me a club ruff, but how to give him the lead? Well, South could be void in diamonds I suppose, and playing out ♦A and another may do the trick. But it seems more likely that declarer is the one who's going to be short in diamonds, on the bidding... and anyway, it looks pretty certain that partner had a singleton trump from the play on the first round of trumps.

So with my heart in my mouth, I underled my ♥A in a desperate / risky / inspired attempt [you decide] to give Roger the lead — surely he wouldn't open a vulnerable weak-two as dealer without a top honour in hearts?!

My faith in partner was fully justified... Roger won with the ♥K, cashed the ♣K and led a third club for a ruff.

I was mentally totting up the score for 3 down doubled vulnerable, when declarer ruffed high (a loser-on-loser diamond discard works equally well) to restrict the defence to four tricks. That's two down doubled for a 500 penalty to EW, which could score very well for them if NS have game on for 620+ (as is indeed the case).

Note that if declarer had risked the finesse on the opening lead, it would have been 3 down for an 800 penalty, and a likely bottom for EW. And my underlead would also have gained a crucial trick if declarer's clubs had been ♣Kx rather then ♣xx, but as the cards lay it made no difference. Oh well, they say virtue is its own reward?!

In fact, the scores on this board were predictably varied, all the way from +710 for 5♥ by South making all thirteen tricks, via -200 for 6♥ doubled down one, to -790 for 4♠ doubled by West just making. Some played in 5♦ which can also make, but is likely to go one down when East leads a spade and North tries for a spade ruff, which is foiled by the 9-1 split in spades and an "overruff" by East playing ahead of dummy... slightly unlucky! 

Even bigger scores are possible, as the 6♥ slam by South is tricky but makeable (rather like 5♦ by North), and almost every plausible contract is likely to be doubled, by either side. With all four players having a singleton, both declarer and defence have a number of pitfalls awaiting them in the play on many lines. Try the deal with BridgeWebs "Play it again" and see how you'd have done in your preferred contract.

On this occasion we had to settle for a penalty of two down doubled vulnerable and hope for a top, while fearing a bottom (+500 was an average plus, as it turned out). I was happy with that, plus all that extra excitement thrown in. I'd say that was pretty well bid and played by everyone at the table, especially West.

Dave Simmons

... This is a rare case where a hold-up on the first three rounds of a suit is required! North can work out at trick 1 that the club suit is blocked, so if he also holds up on the third round of clubs, declarer needs not one but an unlikely two entries to dummy, the first to establish and the second to run the long clubs. North's third-round hold up has killed dummy's long club suit stone dead. Let's see how the play would go.

Declarer is probably more irritated than dismayed by the marathon hold-up, as it looks like he has a second entry to dummy with the ♦10 assuming the suit breaks 3-2. He cashes two top diamonds, and that wipes the smile from his face — the suit breaks 4-1 and his second entry has disappeared.

The best he can do now is to cross to the ♠K and take the marked diamond finesse, for 10 tricks (see what I mean about double-dummy). The defender's clever play has saved a crucial overtrick, which often makes a significant difference at Match Points, especially when the contract appears to be a "routine" one like this, on the bidding.

You may think opportunities for triple hold-ups at bridge are rarer than hen's teeth, but consider the opening lead again, after a slightly different auction of say 2C – 2D – 3NT. On this bidding, there's quite a good case for considering the lead of a heart or spade (as the opposition haven't looked for a major suit fit via Stayman).

On a good day, North may hit on the inspired lead of ♥J rather than the regulation low club. Bingo, the lead strikes gold, and now declarer is in big trouble, cursing his luck that the defender has found the one lead that can trouble him.

Now the only way he can make the contract (barring an unlikely singleton ♣K) is to pray that the defender with the club stopper also has the shorter hearts. A hold-up is no good, nor is a double hold-up as the cards lie.  But a triple hold-up of the ♥A does the trick, exhausting North of hearts, so that when he gets in with his club stopper, he can do no further damage. Declarer just loses three hearts and a club.

So there you are... a routine 3NT making on the nail, with optimum double-dummy play by both defence and declarer, for a flat board... well, maybe in the Bermuda Bowl.

On the night, anything from 8 to 11 tricks were made by West in NT, and several pairs ended up in diamonds somehow, making from 10 to 12 tricks. One pair even managed to bid and make a small slam in 6♦ despite the bad breaks in both minor suits... you try it, it looks impossible to me!

Which all goes to show that there's no such thing as a standard contract at club bridge.

Dave Simmons

Even if N takes the unusual step of passing, EW still don’t have an easy route to slam. In that case cue bidding would show AK of Hearts enabling E to bid 6C.

However, the more usual route is for N to open 1S.

If EW use strong jump overcalls a bid of 3C may get EW on track to game or slam, which may or may not depend upon what S bids. But intermediate jump overcalls are more popular and require E to make a Take-Out Double, indicating opening points and a tolerance for the other suits, or, as here, a strong unbalanced hand – all will be revealed on the next round.

Now, it’s over to S. Responding to 1S followed by an overcall, modern best practice is to use raises pre-emptively and to raise partner to the level of the fit, i.e. to the total number of trumps held. So, over 1S-double, best bid is 3S, which at least puts doubts into the mind of W. Over 1S-3C, 3S isn’t that discouraging to W, who should simply bid 4H, leaving partner to go back to C. However a bolder bid is 4S which forces W to the 5 level. A simple raise of N to 2S should make it easier for EW.

By the time it gets to W there’s already been a lot of bidding and may leave W uncertain about where to go.

1S-3C-3S-?       W should bid 4H.

1S-3C-4S-?       5H might be left or raised to 6H. 5C may be passed. Anything else is guesswork.

1S-double-3S-?    W needs courage to bid 4H and may simply pass.

1S-double-2S-?      Easy 3H bid.

If W has bid 4H, even if N bids 4S, it’s reasonable, but a bit of a guess, for E to get to 6C, and it may be best for E to simply punt 6C and hope for the best, rather than to try Blackwood. Simple Blackwood is only a slight help here (as with many minor suit small slams); 4NT-5C, would be left, but doesn’t show enough to be certain of 11 tricks, and 4NT-5D doesn’t show enough to feel certain of 12 tricks but 5C has been passed and so 6C has to be bid. A 4NT-5H sequence, however, would lead on to 6C, 7C or 7NT – but that doesn’t apply here as NS must have something to bid S to the 4 level, even if overbidding.

If W is persuaded to pass, EW may not get to game or NS may steal the contract in Spades.

Well done to those three EWs who got into 6C, especially if it was by a controlled sequence and not merely good fortune!

Morgan Bunday

Declarer tried the 9 and I was pleased to see partner's 10 hold. He returned a small Heart. I covered declarer's card and returned another Club. Partner won with Q whilst declarer discarded a Spade. Another Heart was returned and my holding of AQ1085 was good enough again. I returned a third low Club, this time declarer tried the 7, but partner had the 8. A third Heart return was won and I cleared the Hearts with A, 5; then did the same with my remaining Clubs.

At this point we had taken the first 10 tricks but my partner had only turned up with a mere 2 points for his double. Also declarer had not claimed the remainder. So I found partner with the Spade Ace for 7-off and 2000 points (as it was). 

Kevin Clark

A quick count of the hand is 6 spades, a heart, 2 diamonds and 2 clubs [politely presetup by the opposition]. 11 tricks. A 12^th can come from the diamond finesse, maybe?

I took out trumps, finding the 3-1 split [expected of course, but was hoping] ending in dummy and removed the club blockage. Again, a quick check of the hand shows the same number of tricks, but this time showing a problem. If the diamond finesse fails, there is no longer an entry to dummy. [I was hoping for a 2-2 split so my entry was assured if things went well]. In pairs the overtrick is very important, of course, so was worth considering what to do next. …..

First glance, it’s hopeless. So one does what most people do in this situation, you run off the winners and hope! Now its just a case of how to do that …

There's a slight chance that one person has a doubleton queen, in which case the jack is good. However, we can find that out later ….

There's a slight chance that both big hearts are in the east hand, and on leading hearts from dummy, east is sleepy and doesn’t rise with a big one [but east is a good player, so say that's silly].

At the table based on the above, I lead a heart, east played low, and I played the ace, west dropping the ten.

Then the tried and tested method , I ran off ALL the trumps. At some point West dropped the queen of hearts [joy :) ]. Presumably he kept his 3 small diamonds so I was kept in the dark as to distribution and the queen hearts was always going to drop on his partner's king.

If you look at the position on the last 4 cards as I played the last trump ….

The West hand is irrelevant. East however has to keep his king of hearts and still cover the diamond situation. Whichever he throws, he gives declarer a trick. At the table he threw his heart king, so we made the final 3 tricks. If he had thrown the diamond, I'd cross to the diamonds and drop his queen.

Analysts showing this sort of hand say this and that. Me, on the other hand, hadn't much hope when I did this, but I stuck to the following rules: When you get into this sort of situation and you need to run off your winners and hope, then the key elements are:

1. lose all the tricks you want bar one. In this case I had 11 top tricks, and I'd lost one, leaving one 'in the wash';
2. leave a menace situation in both hands [in this example the hearts weren’t 'pure' as I was missing both top hearts after playing the ace, but dummy was keeping diamonds fully occupied;
3. run off all the long suit [if trumps, don’t keep one back just in case]. On this hand for example if I had kept one back then East had a spare card to throw and could afford to keep both menaces intact.

Having done that, carry it out !

Note : The above play is called a simple squeeze. If it hadn't worked, I would have still made the tricks I could count, so it was adding to my chances of making more. It's a very simple technique and worth adding to your armoury as you just need to comply with the above points, and hope the defenders have to, or inadvertantly, ditch their winning cards on your winners.

Good Hunting !

Keith Darley

5♣ looks safe or more cautiously a 4♣ bid that will be raised to 5♣ by West. But what if East hopes that West's continuation to 3♣ must mean some extra values and bids 3NT?

North will likely lead one of the two unbid suits:-

If a spade is lead, then West can make 11 tricks by setting up 2 diamond tricks, rather than playing on the heart finesses which would risk the 3NT contract.

If a diamond is led, then West does not make the extra spade but still makes 10 tricks.  A heart lead from North could keep the contract to 3NT if West takes the heart finesse. Even then South still has to place North with the 10♥ .

In the unlikely event of East playing the contact in 3NT, then a spade lead from South will hold it to 3NT but much more likely that South will lead A♦  to look around and then it does not matter if South makes a switch because then East can still set up 2 diamond tricks, with 5 clubs 2 spades and a heart making 10 tricks.

The take-home message is 3NT is so often a better contract than 5 in a minor.

Jules Davidoff

Dave Simmons contributed this additional thought:-

She chose the simpler line, and ran the spade. South is certainly less likely to hold the ♠Q as he's shown extreme length in hearts, so is likely to be short in spades. But South could hold something like 8 hearts and ♠Qxx on the bidding, and the odds against a 5-1 split in spades are also quite small. Not much in it either way, in my opinion. Maybe toss a coin time?!

Click on Show All Hands to see the gory details. Declarer decided to finesse, guessing right of course, and was claiming all thirteen tricks a few seconds later. But note that the equally reasonable line of going up with the ♠A and trying to ruff out the ♠Q happens to fail as the cards lie.

Looking at the traveller afterwards, the vast majority of results were 6♣= / 6♣+1 by West and 6♥-1 by South (the contracts often doubled, both ways). Our opponents were the only pair to bid 7♣. And if 7♣ goes just one down, we get a near top with 32 Match Points, but as it was we got an absolute bottom and a Eurovision-style "null points".

Getting 32 MPs on that single board would have dragged us up by a few percent, scraped us into the top twelve in the rankings and earned us half a Blue Point for our trouble. But it was not to be.

Oh well, next year at Eastbourne...  see you there?!

Dave Simmons

ANSWERS

In a NT contract played by West North can try any lead except K♦ to start. Let's try J♥ which we see must be taken by K♥ and then assuming it was a singleton lead hoping to set up partner we can finesse the hearts and run the spades, also taking advantage of the QJ dropping doubleton. On trick 10, North has no safe discard. He has to keep A♣ and K♦ but can only hang on to one other card.  If he keeps a club, the K♦ will drop. if he keeps a diamond he can be thrown in with the A♣ and will have to lead away from his Kx. Of course, being double-dummy, declarer has no problem "guessing" this situation! In reality, declarer would be much more likely to simply run the Q♦ at this point and hope the finesse worked, a 50% shot.

You can also try the spade contracts. West as declarer is safe. It will play the same way as a NT contract. East as declarer (click East/spades in the box) turns out to be unable to avoid a club or diamond loser, but only if South starts with a club honour as the opening lead.

You can find the rest of the answers for yourself, meanwhile some more bridge-related quotes from Casablanca.

Start of the evening/afternoon

Captain Renault: Carl, see that Major Strasser gets a good table, one close to the ladies.
Carl: I have already given him the best, knowing he is German and would take it anyway.

New partner

Rick: I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

Arguing with partner (as if we would)

Rick: Last night we said a great many things. You said I was to do the thinking for both of us. Well, I've done a lot of it since then, and it all adds up to one thing: you're getting on that plane.

Discussing partnership agreements

Sam: You must remember this...

Playing in tempo

Sam: The fundamental things apply... as time goes by

Defensive technique

Rick: And remember, this gun is pointed right at your heart.
Captain Renault: That is my least vulnerable spot.

Opening leads

Ilsa: We said no questions.
Rick: ...Here's looking at you, kid.

Rick: I'm sorry for asking. I forgot we said "no questions".
Ilsa: Well, only one answer can take care of all our questions.

Building confidence

Laszlo: This time I know our side will win.

Laszlo: I know a good deal

Dummy objecting to Declarer's choice

Rick: You played it for her, you can play it for me!
Sam: [lying] Well, I don't think I can remember...
Rick: If she can stand it, I can! Play it!

Peter Rice

In 7♦, your only thought should be making the contract. Once the trumps break 3-2 (phew!), is there anything else that can go wrong?

Well, the hearts could still break 4-0 and one defender may have ♥Jxxx.  Stranger things have happened.

On a spade lead, it's pretty straightforward.  Draw trumps, cross to the hearts, and even if they break badly, you can ruff a heart, and cross back to the ♣A and claim all 13 tricks.

On a club lead (which was what I got), not quite so easy.  If South turns out to have all four hearts to the Jack, then all you can do is curse your bad luck, smile through clenched teeth, and congratulate your opponents on their defence. But if North has all four hearts, you can still make, so long as you play carefully. Draw trumps, play a heart to dummy discovering the bad break, cross back to hand with a spade, and take the marked finesse in hearts.

Did I follow this line?  Well, I cannot tell a lie... in the excitement of playing only the second grand slam of my life, I just ran all the trumps on the unlikely chance of a defender discarding a heart, and then crossed to dummy and ran the hearts from the top. If the hearts happen to break 4-0, it's now too late to do anything about it.

Not a difficult hand, but easy to play carelessly in the heat of the moment. Click on Show All Hands to see that on this occasion I got away with it -- the hearts broke, and 7♦ makes with two overtricks! 

But next time, I'll try and remember Rixi's excellent advice before I play the hand... not the next day!

Dave Simmons