[Phil]

From the 1st set of the R16 of the USBC:

---

Partner tracks the ♥A.

Plan your defense.

[xcurt]

Partner is a huge favorite to have the♠A as well, else why the dry ace lead. It looks like we are supposed to cash AK in both majors then tap dummy in spades to ensure the ♣K takes a trick. Is he more likely to do something silly if I encourage or discourage? Declarer might have ♣QJTxxxx, ♥Q, ♦K, in which case partner might think the point of the hand is to build my presumed ♦K before a heart pitch is built. Or declarer might have ♠Qxx, in which case a shift to the ♠A is fatal. I can avoid all this by encouraging, winning T2, and playing ♠K, spade. If the ♥J is now good, all the better, because theres only one possible defense at that point, its too late to try to build a diamond trick.

[inquiry]

Nice hand. I don't have anything to add to what xcurt said. A first seat vulnerable 3♣ bid should be at least six good clubs (missing the king), and seven is not out of the question. So they will have 6♣, 2♦, and a possible heart without too much problems, worse they might have 7♣, 2♦.... I think i go with xcurt's encourage, win 2nd heart, switch to spade king and spade.

[JLOGIC]

I don't understand why this is a problem? I would encourage then play spades lol. Wtf?

[JLOGIC]

Also passing seems bad and wildly gambling.

[Phil]

xcurt, on 2012-April-29, 19:37, said:

Partner is a huge favorite to have the♠A as well, else why the dry ace lead. It looks like we are supposed to cash AK in both majors then tap dummy in spades to ensure the ♣K takes a trick. Is he more likely to do something silly if I encourage or discourage? Declarer might have ♣QJTxxxx, ♥Q, ♦K, in which case partner might think the point of the hand is to build my presumed ♦K before a heart pitch is built. Or declarer might have ♠Qxx, in which case a shift to the ♠A is fatal. I can avoid all this by encouraging, winning T2, and playing ♠K, spade. If the ♥J is now good, all the better, because theres only one possible defense at that point, its too late to try to build a diamond trick.

I had considered this, but this defense looks like you might be looking for a heart ruff after partner wins the 2nd spade.

[JLOGIC]

You can shift to LOW to say you have an honor and don't want a ruff lol. Or you can just shift to the king.

[CSGibson]

agree with Justin. Encourage in hearts, then shift to your lowest spade when in with the heart. If you wanted a heart ruff, you'd have gone K of spades-spade, or your highest spot to let partner know you need a switch - its lucky the 2 of spades is so readable.

[Phil]

JLOGIC, on 2012-April-29, 22:49, said:

You can shift to LOW to say you have an honor and don't want a ruff lol. Or you can just shift to the king.

No I think Chris makes the right point. If you start ♠K, ♠, that logically says, "I'm putting you in at the point where you have no other choice than to give me a heart ruff". This would be the same classification (on other layouts) as cashing the trump Ace, and then leading your singleton for partner to ruff.

The low spade to me indicates that a) you have the spade honor (hand isn't likely to be beaten otherwise) and b) you don't want the heart ruff.

I'm still trying to work out how we can engineer a diamond ruff if one existed, but that would leave the East hand with a very odd shape. It starts with discouraging hearts obviously.

Those that play obvious shift have an advantage here, I think.

[Phil]

JLOGIC, on 2012-April-29, 22:23, said:

Also passing seems bad and wildly gambling.

I like passing with 4333, but I agree this is pretty reckless.

This is from the Weinstein / Fleisher match. Baseggio had the hand in question and passed. At the other table, Fleisher bid 3N, which went -3. 3♠ is probably -1.

Also, what happened was that Baseggio didn't tap dummy after they cashed two hearts. However, Levin ruffed a spade himself (?!) and took the diamond pitch off the ♥J, so the defense was +200 for 11 IMPs to Weisntein.

Levin made several errors in this set (does a team that has a bye coming in cold generally toss some boards?) so Fleisher had only a small lead after 15.

[phil_20686]

Phil, on 2012-April-30, 08:12, said:

Fleisher bid 3N,

Is this normal? Obviously I see how it can gain, but I would never have considered anything except 3S.

[han]

Phil, on 2012-April-30, 08:03, said:

No I think Chris makes the right point. If you start ♠K, ♠, that logically says, "I'm putting you in at the point where you have no other choice than to give me a heart ruff". This would be the same classification (on other layouts) as cashing the trump Ace, and then leading your singleton for partner to ruff.

How would you get a spade ruff if you had Kx?

[mikeh]

han, on 2012-April-30, 09:08, said:

How would you get a spade ruff if you had Kx?

I think this is a good point.

It seems to me we have 3 possible relevant major suit holdings (in essence): Kxx Kxx, Kx Kxx and Kxx Kx.

On the first two we want to cash our hearts and spades and continue spades. On the latter, we want to cash our majors and continue hearts (whether we need to cash the heart early is an interesting question which I haven't spent the time to analyze).

We have no choice in terms of our play to trick one with the last holding....Kxx Kx...we must play our spot and hope partner can read it (bearing in mind that declarer may be able to falsecard to his advantage....I haven't thought through whether this is really possible).

The key is whether we can cash winners, ending in partner's hand.On layout 3, where we want the heart ruff, we can't choose to discourage....our card is mandatory. If he continues, then we are in hand and the only way we can signal which major we want is by our play in spades....yet we can't!!!! At least, not if declarer holds QJ.

If partner holds AJx(x) or AQx(x), then we can choose K and low or low.

I think it may be right to play partner for one of these holdings...now a low spade says we have more than Kx and thus want a heart ruff, while K and a spade says we have Kx.

Of course, we fake a spade ruff with Kxx Kxx.

With Kxx Kxx or Kx Kxx, we have a choice in hearts. In either case, however, we encourage and then play K and a spade.

So I think that we always want partner to continue and then we choose our spade play by how we want him to play.

I think this is far more complex than the early posts suggested.

[Fluffy]

mikeh, on 2012-April-30, 11:35, said:

I think this is a good point.

I don't because I don't think partner will play declarer to have 5 spades, and I also don't think he has 5-5 majors nor that he tried to lead from, ♥AQxx.

[CSGibson]

han, on 2012-April-30, 09:08, said:

How would you get a spade ruff if you had Kx?

Presumably by playing K - x when the dummy suggests that its even remotely possible that we'd be looking for a spade ruff. Since that's not the case, I think partner would be playing us for a heart ruff with that sequence. My suggestion wasn't a suggestion for every dummy, just the one we're looking at.

[JLOGIC]

I still don't get it. How is partner going to go wrong after a low spade? It is insulting to partner to think you have to play the spade king for him.

[JLOGIC]

Phil, on 2012-April-30, 08:12, said:

Levin made several errors in this set (does a team that has a bye coming in cold generally toss some boards?) so Fleisher had only a small lead after 15.

Sometimes bridge players make mistakes, even the best ones.

[phil_20686]

@Phil

If I had doubleton heart, I encourage, win the K and would I not lead a low spade (well the 9) back now for a ruff, so I can score two ruffs when hearts are 4432 and partner has AQ!s? I can overruff dummy with my mighty 7x when declarer is 2407?

I mean presumeably from partners heart pip I am extremely likely to know the heart layout at trick two.

Further, if I play K and a low spade he will realise I cannot want a heart ruff surely? At any rate, it seems like partner always has the information that he needs to work this out from the combination of the bidding, and our carding on the second spade.

[Phil]

han, on 2012-April-30, 09:08, said:

How would you get a spade ruff if you had Kx?

Oh, so partner plays a 3rd spade. Cool.

Seriously, I realize a high spade asks for a heart ruff, and a low spade should mean, defend normally and tap dummy (what else is left to do?). But I saw a very good partnership (Baseggio/Stark) f this up. It was the first segment against a really good team, and they were tighter than a nun's hoo-haw and mistakes were rampant.

But isn't that the time where you want to try to make things as easy and as clear as possible for partner?