All News

Daily Bridge in New Zealand

For Junior, Intermediate and Novice players…and others! It’s Fri yay 2.png  day!

“Light Hearted”

It has been a bit of a heavy week with deals involving squeezes and end-plays. It’s time for something more straightforward…and a question for you. How would you like to play as West the following two hands in 4Heart-small with North leading Diamond-small2 ?

Bridge in NZ.png nz map.jpg

East Deals
N-S Vul

   

Spade-small

5

Heart-small

A K 6 5

Diamond-small

Q J 6 4

Club-small

K 8 6 4

 

N

W

 

E

S

 

Spade-small

K J 10 6

Heart-small

J 7 4 2

Diamond-small

A

Club-small

Q J 10 5

At this point, I will not give you the full bidding. East started with 1Club-small and South called 1Spade-small. There was no other opposition bidding with East-West bidding to 4Heart-small. I can tell you that the heart break is friendly, 3-2. So, how many tricks would you expect to make? Decide before you read on.

So, what would you bid as West over South’s 1Spade-small? A negative double seems about right with East then bidding 2Heart-small and West, with enough hcp to bid to game, raising to 4Heart-small. However, West became declarer when they bid 2Heart-small over 1Spade-small, a little “crime” as that really promises at least 5 hearts.

So you said maybe that declarer wins Diamond-smallA, plays a couple of high hearts and then a club losing to Club-smallA. Even if South then plays Heart-smallQ, it looks like declarer can get to the West hand to play a spade to Spade-small10 losing to Spade-smallQ. Whether or not South has Diamond-smallK, a declarer need only lose Club-smallA, Spade-smallQ and a trump…and if the Heart-smallQ was doubleton, maybe even better than that.

8-0…maybe a football, unlikely a rugby score. What about a Bridge percentage?

Dreams are free. Welcome to West’s nightmare! With 8 cards missing in a suit, the percentage chance of the break being 8-0 is 0.2% and in reality is less than that when a player holding 8 is a defender…and has not taken a bid! So, West could feel a bit non-plussed when their Diamond-smallA was ruffed with Heart-small8 at trick 1. Someone might have asked South whether they really had no diamonds. West would presume they had revoked! But no! Worse was to follow, that is for West:

East Deals
N-S Vul

Spade-small

9 8

Heart-small

9 3

Diamond-small

K 10 9 8 7 5 3 2

Club-small

3

Spade-small

5

Heart-small

A K 6 5

Diamond-small

Q J 6 4

Club-small

K 8 6 4

 

N

W

 

E

S

 

Spade-small

K J 10 6

Heart-small

J 7 4 2

Diamond-small

A

Club-small

Q J 10 5

 

Spade-small

A Q 7 4 3 2

Heart-small

Q 10 8

Diamond-small

Club-small

A 9 7 2

 

West

North

East

South

 

 

1 Club-small

1 Spade-small

2 Heart-small

Pass

3 Heart-small

Pass

4 Heart-small

All pass

 

 

That Diamond-small2 suggested that if South won the lead, that they play back a club (lower non- trump suit)…even better if they held Club-smallA. So, Club-smallA was followed by a club ruff and a second low diamond. West did the best they could by ruffing with Heart-smallJ but Heart-smallQ beat that. Then, a second club ruff and yet another diamond. In desperation, West tried Heart-small7 but South could beat that with Heart-small10!

Trumps were then all drawn though not in the way West would have wished! There was still a spade trick for the defence to come… 5 ruffs and 2 black aces meant down 4 in a game contract where the declaring side had 25 hcp, an 8 card trump fit and fairly good trumps.

That was a little cruel on West though had East been declarer, the defence could still have beaten the game by 3 tricks (one less ruff for South). Several declarers did make 4Heart-small when the ruffing never started and one pair actually made 3NT, a contract helped considerably by the 8-0 diamond break!

Unfortunately, some North players did decide to bid their 8-card suit rather too aggressively with only 8 tricks for North if the defence take their two heart tricks early. … a terrible result for the declaring side even if not doubled.

plan A  plan B.png  
There was no "Plan B" this time for West. 

Someone, indeed many, say one should make a plan at trick 1 before one plays to dummy. Poor West’s plan here was blown apart by the very first card South played. “ Multi Light hearted” contract indeed!

Richard Solomon

Go Back View All News Items

Our Sponsors