Tuesday, March 06, 2007

Tight defense

Playing imps, the auction went (West dealer, EW vulnerable):
1NT - 2* - pass - 2*
pass - pass - Dbl - pass
2 - pass - pass - pass

2 shows either or both Majors
2 is "Pass or Correct"

Partner leads J and you see following dummy:
6542
KQ7
5
Q8653

You hold:
A83
JT953
A8
T92

Obviously you take A at trick 1.

How do you plan the defense?

Question is how you'll defeat this contract. EW have 22-24HCP, this leaves partner with 7-9HCP. You already know partner doesn't have K or Q. LHO might have passed with 4 s from KQ, so he probably has only 3 s. This also explains partner's intervention: a poor but long suit. So his values must be somewhere else. The only way to defeat this contract seems if he has good trumps and an Ace. Partner will have 2 trumps at most, so chances are low. However, A or A or K won't run away on declarer's s. We can overruff dummy, so I think the best opportunity we have is to continue a and hope.

Here's the full deal:

Dealer:West
Vul:EW
Scoring:imps
KJ
62
JT97643
A7
QT97
A84
KQ2
KJ4
6542
KQ7
5
Q8653
A83
JT953
A8
T92


This is what should happen: declarer plays a to the K and plays a low trump. You play low and declarer inserts the Ten for partner's Jack. Partner also knows you don't have any s left so he'll play his lowest remaining to show a suit preference. You can ruff with the 8, return a to partner's Ace who returns another (to promote his K if you have the Q) which you ruff with the Ace. Even better!

Only a dummy reversal for the defenders gets this contract down. A,
A and 4 tricks is just enough.

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