[manudude03]

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♣4 lead run round the the 3-9-T. Plan the play. I will post continuations based on replies.

[pooltuna]

trick 2] small ♠ to the J

[manudude03]

pooltuna, on 2011-August-04, 10:26, said:

trick 2] small ♠ to the J

East wins the K and returns a club.

[pooltuna]

manudude03, on 2011-August-04, 10:35, said:

East wins the K and returns a club.

win in dummy and return your other ♠

[manudude03]

pooltuna, on 2011-August-04, 10:40, said:

win in dummy and return your other ♠

East plays low, you finessing or going up?

[pooltuna]

manudude03, on 2011-August-04, 10:43, said:

East plays low, you finessing or going up?

going up

[jjbrr]

Hold on a second... can we discuss the auction please?

[rhm]

I do not understand the rationale for playing ♠ at trick 2. It must be better to play on ♦ first. If West has 5 ♣s and East 2, you want to drive out West's entry first.
A spade can probably be taken by either defender and East will be keen to win the first trick for the defense to return his remaining ♣.
Also opponents may switch erroneously to ♠ if you lead ♦, while they are very unlikely to switch to ♦ if you lead ♠.
So drive out the ♦ ace, which might be with West. Low to the ♦jack.

Rainer Herrmann

[manudude03]

pooltuna, on 2011-August-04, 15:09, said:

going up

West will win and play another club (East showing out).

I assume you'd drive out the ♦A now, East would win and return a spade.

jjbrr, on 2011-August-04, 15:22, said:

Hold on a second... can we discuss the auction please?

I opened a 15-17 NT, partner stayman'ed hoping to invite if I had hearts and when I bid 2S, he's kinda forced into 2N now. I decide to accept with my minimum hence this slightly thin 3N This was a new partner, hadn't discussed invite philosophy lol.

[VM1973]

Driving out the Ace of diamonds has to be the first line of play. You get 3 tricks at the cost of 1. As has already been pointed out, attacking spades will surely result in East winning and leading a club. I recommend leading low to the ♦J at trick 2.

[manudude03]

If you play on diamonds first, East wins the second round (West showing doubleton if giving honest count) and returns a club.

[rhm]

manudude03, on 2011-August-04, 18:20, said:

If you play on diamonds first, East wins the second round (West showing doubleton if giving honest count) and returns a club.

I will unblock a ♦ honor from hand on the second ♦, win the ♣ return in hand and play a ♠ to the jack.
If East wins and returns a third ♣, I am forced to finesse the ♠8 next.

Rainer Herrmann

[VM1973]

Apparently East will duck the first diamond. That might be the opportunity to play on spades. My line of play would be more like:

Win the first one in hand, cheaply.
Small to the ♦J winning.
Small spade towards the ♠Q in hand.

If West wins and plays another club when East wins in he won't have a club to return (unless they're 4-3).

[jh51]

jjbrr, on 2011-August-04, 15:22, said:

Hold on a second... can we discuss the auction please?

I feel the same way. Responder has the worst possible 7HCP I could imagine, and Opener has a minimum. IMO responder should have passed 1NT and opener had no business accepting an invitation. The bidding seems odd to me.

[dcohio]

K&R gives opener a 14.9 and responder a 5.65

Passing 1NT as north seems obvious, and if you aren't going to decline an invitation on a minimum, why bother using invitational bids? Just blast game every hand

[Mbodell]

To be fair each hand has 2 T, none are 4333. Maybe the N hand is a Banzai point player as 13 Banzai points is a perfect invite opposite a strong nt. The S hand is only 22 Banzai though which is minimum, so shouldn't accept by Banzai.

[manudude03]

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[gnasher]

We should probably make on this layout, assuming we eschew the strange play of a spade at trick two (or three).

After we've knocked out the diamond, won the club in hand, and played a spade to the jack, what will East do? He won't fancy a heart, so he'll play back either a spade or a diamond. Now we'll have the reasonable line of a spade to the queen, cashing the minors, and then playing spades from the top. That works when ♠9 is trebleton, of East has ♥K + ♠9 or ♠AKx.

I know that in theory East could switch to a heart from the king, or not switch to a heart with something like A9xx Jxxx Axx xx. In practice, however, people don't do that sort of thing.

[VM1973]

Well if I had played it...

Win 10♣ in hand.
♦J wins.
low spade... I think East should go up with the ♠A and lead back a club, though even if he ducks it doesn't matter because then West wins with ♠K and with no other entries the hand becomes easy.

I count:
2 spades
1 heart
3 diamonds
3 clubs

If East doesn't win the ♠A and if the ♠9 doesn't fall you have to play West for the ♥J and finesse the ♥10 as if West has the ♥K he will go up with it and cash his clubs anyway and you're down so no sense leading low to the ♥Q.

Edit: Though you will need to unblock the ♦KQ in order to ensure communication to the dummy in the event you have to fall back on the heart trick.