[FrancesHinden]

Back playing another total points (aggregate) match, the first one of the next year's competition.

Scoring: Total Points

P P 2♣ P
2♦ P 2NT P
3♣ P 3♦ P
6NT P P P

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Opener has shown 23-24 HCP and no 5-card major.
You get the 8 of hearts lead. Plan the play.
[once I get a consensus to the first few tricks, I'll tell you what happens in the suit you choose to play on]

[lowerline]

Take in hand. Diamond to the king, diamond finesse. What happens?

[Codo]

I would try to establish 4 diamond tricks.
If I play the king and another, I see 3 small from the opponents before I have to decide which one I have to play from hand. I think, there is no difference between the jack and the nine, so I take the jack, (of course loosing :-)) win the Heart return and play the ace of Diamonds.
If I am happy to cahs four diamond tricks, I will unblock my Clubs and return to hand in HEart. Maybe someone is squeezed between the 4. club and the King of spades, but I think, that I need the spade finesse as a last ressort.
If I am unlucky in Diamonds and have just two tricks, I need a miracle in spades and will play rho for KT sec. in spades.

[cnszsun]

I will paly first 3 ♦s tricks the same as posted.
If ♦J wins, i will revert to ♠ suit, play a small ♠ toward dummy's Q. With West holding ♠K, he has to duck, then i can continue playing ♦ suit even if 4-2 break. With East holding ♠K, I can prevail with either ♠ or ♦ break 3-3.
If ♦ finesse loses, then i need ♦ break 3-3, then ♠K on side or ♠, ♣ squeeze (i will not try the chance of stiff KJ on east).

[FrancesHinden]

I thought playing on diamonds was obvious as well, just seeing if there were any other ideas.

Anyway, you play a diamnod to the king and a second diamond.
RHO plays the Queen on the second round.

Your opponents are of a standard such that this is 99% certain to be from Qx.

[SoTired]

take ♥ in hand, ♦K, finesse ♦J (finesse ♦9 is no win play. if Q10xx onside, you can't finesse diam again anyway. if Q10xx offside, no difference. if diam are 33, 9 gives us 2 chances to lose while J only 1).
If ♦J wins, unblock clubs, lead ♠AJ. They take ♠K and lead a ♥. Win in hand and test ♦ (pitch ♣), then ♠. You make if either ♠ or ♦ 33, or ♠10 drops.

If ♦J loses, you need spade finesse even if ♦ are 33. Unblock clubs, test diam, pitching club in dummy. if ♦10 does not fall you need 4 spade tricks and only 1 entry to dummy. Only way to do that is find ♠Kx onside. Lead small ♠ from dummy,finesse ♠J, cash ♠A dropping ♠K and finesse ♠9.

There might be some squeezes along the way, but I could not figure out how to untangle the discards and entries. For example, if you prematurely cash the ♣K what will you discard from South?

[Dwingo]

Even if you establish 4 ♦ tricks, that is 11 in total. You will still need a ♠ finesse or a ♣ - ♠ squeeze.

You could probably try another route. Take with the ♥K and low ♠ to J. If this holds, revert back to ♦ trying to establish 4 ♦'s. If it loses, you will still have a lot of chances. If ♠'s are 3-3, then again come to 11 tricks + ♦ finesse or a ♣ - ♦ squeeze. If ♠'s are not 3-3 also , you still have quite good chances with the 4th ♣ and 4th ♠ serving as threat card and if ♦ Q is inside, you will be able to run 4 ♦ tricks in the end position. Possibility of throw in with either 4th ♣ or 4th ♠ also exists ( after cashing the ♦ K ) depending on the cards played by Opps when cashing the ♠'s, ♥'s and ♣'s.

Don't ask me the probability math for this line, but I have a gut feeling this may offer a better chance that attacking ♦'s straight away.

[Free]

I will start off with taking in my hand and play ♠J. I have lots of chances, including squeeze possibilities imo. Opponents can't play any suit safely, except ♥. So what ♥ should you take at trick 1? I think the J.

[cnszsun]

FrancesHinden, on Sep 11 2006, 04:54 PM, said:

I thought playing on diamonds was obvious as well, just seeing if there were any other ideas.

Anyway, you play a diamnod to the king and a second diamond.
RHO plays the Queen on the second round.

Your opponents are of a standard such that this is 99% certain to be from Qx.

If RHO has ♦Qx, LHO has 4♦s, then in theory ♠K is more likely to be in rho's hand, but i still feel my original line has better chance.
Lead a small ♠ toward dummy's Q. With West holding ♠K, he has to duck, then i can continue playing ♦ suit to setup one ♦ trick. With East holding ♠K, I can still prevail with either ♠ 3-3 or ♠Tx or remote chance of ♦ 3-3.

[Codo]

If rho shows me the queen the third trick, my chances improved.
I now see 9 tricks outside spades, so I just need to play the spades for 3 tricks, as long as I can handle my communication.

I will try a spade to the queen. This wins immedeately, if lho has the king. If he ducks, I can return to hand and develop a fourth diamond trick. If he wins, I have my three tricks.

If rho has the King, I will survive if someone has Ten x in spades or if the spades are 3-3.

I think, the second best line is the ace of spades followed by the eight, intending to let it run. This wins against any holding with the ten in Lhos hand and against Kx. And against some other distributions, where lho has the King third or longer but is not able to duck the second round...
To play the spade suit different may have better chances as long as the suit is isolated, but I don´t have sufficent entries to dummy.
There are lines, where I can play for 4 spade tricks, in which case I can overtake my queen of clubs as a second entry if needed, but I doubt that they are superior.

[SoTired]

Yes - that is better than my play. After ♦Q pops up, rather than ♠AJ, play ♠A8. That wins whenever ♠K with LHO, ♠10 drops, or ♠ or ♦are 33.

[cnszsun]

SoTired, on Sep 11 2006, 07:26 PM, said:

Yes - that is better than my play. After ♦Q pops up, rather than ♠AJ, play ♠A8. That wins whenever ♠K with LHO, ♠10 drops, or ♠ or ♦are 33.

Not ♠A8, but ♠8 only i think.
If you play A,8, LHO will duck if he has K, you have no safety next move.

[mikeh]

After the ♦Q pops, we seem to have 3 lines (at least, 3 appeared to me )

Concede the ♦ and take the ♠ hook. I don't like this line: LHO went very passive with his lead, and there is a slight inference that he holds the ♠K...actually two slight inferences: he has shorter ♦ than east, and he chose a ♥ as his passive lead rather than a ♠.

Win the ♦A and lead a low ♠. If LHO has the K, he must duck. If RHO wins the K, I am still ok if the suit behaves. This has to be a significantly better line than the first.

Win the ♦A and cash the round suit winners, ending in hand, and play two rounds of ♦, endplaying W if he began with no round suit longer than 3 cards... say 3=3=4=3 or 4=3=4=2.

I like the endplay line, perhaps only because I like endplays However, it seems inferior to the second line: gaining only when LHO has long ♠ lacking the K: which must be anti-percentage (not to mention the embarrassment I'd feel if LHO cashed a long round suit or 2. So I choose line 2: low ♠ at trick 4.

[FrancesHinden]

I took mikeh's line (3 rounds of diamonds, spade towards the queen) and went off.
Opponents managed to get to the dizzy heights of 3NT on the hand.

I've thought quite a lot about it since since losing a slam swing at aggregate concentrates the mind somewhat.

Some of the lines suggested are definitely worse than this, but there seem to be 3 sensible candidates and they are quite hard to evaluate.

Line1: Play on diamonds, then if you have 3 tricks and no loser try a spade towards the queen.
Line2: Win the heart in hand, cross to the DK and take a spade finesse (no-one here suggested this , I think, but a team-mate did afterwards). If that wins, play diamonds out of hand.
Line3: Win the heart in dummy and take a spade finesse. If that wins, unblock and cash clubs before playing on diamonds.

Line1 makes if
1. diamonds play for 5 tricks, or
2. diamonds play for 4 tricks with an early loser + the spade finesse, or
3. diamonds play for 3 fast tricks excl. 3-3Qonside + (SK on left or S10 coming down in 3 rounds), or
4. Kx spade onside

line2 makes if
5: if the SJ holds, makes if diamonds play for 4 tricks starting from the top (or any 5-1 diamonds+Kx spade) 0
if the SJ loses, cash winners then take a diamond finesse, makes if
6. diamonds play for 5 tricks, or
7. spades play for 3 tricks + diamond finesse is right
8. diamonds play for 3 fast tricks + minor suit squeeze

Line3 is the same as Line2 if the SJ loses, but if the SJ holds makes if diamonds play for 4 tricks (or Kx spade) but the hand that wins a diamond cannot cash a club.

I make line3 worse than Line2. The gain from playing diamonds via a second round finesse isn't that big (wins with Qxx or Q10xx onside, loses to Qx offside) and the risk of a club being cashed I think is close to 50%.

I did some sums, which I might have got wrong because they are quite complicated (careful to avoid double-counting) and I made line1 just under 70% and line2 a little under 60%.

That's all well and good but sadly line2 is the winner. (So is setting up diamonds and taking a spade finesse.)

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[Free]

GIB starts with ♦9 to the king and finesse in ♠, so I don't think line 1 has 10% more chance of succeeding than line 2, but rather the other way around.

[FrancesHinden]

Free, on Sep 12 2006, 01:31 PM, said:

GIB starts with ♦9 to the king and finesse in ♠, so I don't think line 1 has 10% more chance of succeeding than line 2, but rather the other way around.

While it's quite possible my sums are wrong, I don't consider that evidence as in the least bit compelling.

[kgr]

Free, on Sep 12 2006, 02:31 PM, said:

GIB starts with ♦9 to the king and finesse in ♠, so I don't think line 1 has 10% more chance of succeeding than line 2, but rather the other way around.

Jack plays (after top H, 2 top clubs and a H): Diamond to K and S to the Jack
1000 samples:
small S: 781.2
small D: 722.7