[GreenMan]

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Lead: ♥Q to the A, East returns a low club to the A, club back to East's K, and a third club, West following.

Is finding the ♠Q anything more than a guess?

I thought that East might have been trying for a club ruff, and thus was marginally more likely to be short in spades, so I played West for the ♠Q. West did have it, but doubleton (and he had the remaining club, too). Was there a better way to approach this?

[lalldonn]

Your approach seems... ok to me, right idea but wrong conclusion. If you really had nothing to go on then you would play east for it since you can pick up the most holdings (singleton Q 9 8 with west), but if you think you have a reasonable clue that west is more likely to have length I would use that. But that is a very small clue since you are playing for clubs to be 3-4 which is just a one card difference (not to mention you aren't even sure of it), and there is also a clue going the other way. East didn't open 2♥, but west could have a normal 2♥ opener and pass over 1♠, so I would expect west to have longer heart length on average and therefore shorter spades. In fact, west's average heart length would be longer even if south was dealer and opened 4♠, since you know he has the jack and possibly also the ten or nine to lead the queen, but you don't have reason to suspect that east has any other particular heart. So combined with king then running the jack being the technically best play in the suit, I would have gotten this one wrong.

* Made some edits to my comment since when I first looked I didn't pay attention and thought our trumps were solid except the queen.

[gnasher]

My first thought is that I should play West for the queen because he didn't lead a trump. He's heard that I have a diamond suit, and he's probably fairly short in diamonds, so a trump might look quite attractive with two or three small cards.

My second thought is that there's something odd going on. East knows of five spades, two hearts and four diamonds in my hand. Why is he playing for a club ruff when he knows it's impossible for me to have three clubs? He'd look pretty silly if I had A10xxxx Kxx Axx K. However, I'm not sure what, of anything, this tells me, so I'm going to stick with my first thought.

[lalldonn]

Andy I have to disagree. For one thing, why is west probably fairly short in diamonds? Then when you answer that, why would the same answer not apply to spades as well?

Secondly, a Q lead from QJ(T)(9) is quite an attractive lead. I don't think an auction like this, where the 3♦ bidder can have just about anything he wants, would really cause most players to look beyond that suit. Maybe you give more credit to the 3♦ bid than I do, but I don't usually trust bids like that in particular since I have seen them made on just about any holding. I think it's a small group of players indeed savvy enough to look beyond an attractive sequence lead, but un-savvy enough to put lots of faith in south's bidding.

As for your second thought, who says east was playing for a club ruff anyway? It seems to me he was just trying to take his tricks and then find a safe exit in hopes of a later trump trick (whether he holds the queen or not), perhaps with an outside shot of a ruff if south had bid strangely. Also east had the club king so your (clever) example doesn't exist.

[gnasher]

Sorry, I'd misread the play - I thought East had switched from the ace, not the king. I agree that my second thought isn't much of a thought.

Quote

For one thing, why is west probably fairly short in diamonds?

I meant that he probably has two or three. That is, the sort of length where he'd think I could safely ruff one or two of them in dummy. With a hand like xxx QJxx xxx Axx or xxx QJxxx xx Axx I might well lead a trump, hoping to protect partner's diamond tricks.

[GreenMan]

Thanks for the replies. I can see I didn't put as much thought into it as I could have. This helps!