[fred]

Scoring: IMP

---

RHO opens the bidding with a weak 2♠ and somehow you and your partner manage to get to 6♥ - an even worse contract than the 3NT in the other Cavendish play problem I posed here.

LHO leads the King of clubs after some thought. RHO follows with the 9 (standard carding).

How do you play?

This one is not so hard, but I did find it amusing

Fred Gitelman
Bridge Base Inc.
www.bridgebase.com

[rogerclee]

No squeeze can operate unless we can eek out an extra trick in clubs, and the only way that's possible is if RHO has ♣97 or ♣T9.

So we have to win trick 1, draw trumps, and play the ♣J from dummy. Win the return, and (assuming RHO plays the ♣7) take a ruffing finesse against LHO's ♣T (if RHO played the ♣9 from ♣T97, he got me).

Then all we need is RHO to hold the ♦KQ and six spades to the K, and he will get ♦-♠ squeezed on the run of the hearts.

[fred]

That is mostly right, but it is a smart idea to cash the Ace of diamonds before you run your winners.

In the actual hand that was dealt, RHO really did have the KQ of diamonds and the 97 doubleton of clubs, but unfortunately declarer (me) had the 5 of clubs instead of the 6 of clubs that was presented in this problem.

So I guess this proves that my 2NT overcall really was an overbid

Fred Gitelman
Bridge Base Inc.
www.bridgebase.com

[Hanoi5]

Yeah, evidently A853 doesn't even compare to A863, how could you?

[Echognome]

Sounds like a good deal for Through the Pack and a tale for the 6 of clubs.