Partner opened 1♠ (11-15 hcp and five or more spades) and I responded 2♦ (game-forcing). Partner bid 3♠ showing a solid suit. I was angling for partner to declare either 6NT or 7NT. So, I started with a cue-bid of 4♣. Since I had made a 2/1 call in diamonds I hoped that with a heart control, he would be the one to bid 4NT (our key-card ask) and therefore be the notrump bidder in a slam. Instead, he bid 4♥. I didn't know whether that was a the K or the A (or conceivably a singleton?), so I now bid 4NT to find out. He responded 5♠ showing "two with". That meant his heart holding was at best Kx. I was pretty sure he didn't have a heart void because he would have jumped to 5♥ (exclusion keycard ask). I therefore had to give up on a grand, and since I couldn't guarantee the ♥A was on my left, we would have to play in spades. I therefore raised to 6♠ on my trump void.
Unfortunately, my good friend Bruce Downing was on lead and, as is his wont, he was listening to the auction. He unerringly reached for a club (dummy's cuebid suit) and this was the layout:
I don't think your auction was bad. Some deals are meant to end up in the trash can.
ReplyDeleteWhat happens if you declare 6NT from South hand and West leads a spade? Do you then have another, but different, tale of woe?
ReplyDeleteMaybe a tale of victory if he reads West's discards correctly. 7 spades, 3 diamonds and a heart will probably score up the contract if West doesn't bare the club king calmly.
ReplyDeleteThere are two reasonable ways to play the hand on a spade lead: strip squeeze (i.e. a squeeze without the count) or cross to hand and finesse the HK. The latter risks going down a lot of course and, in any case, squeezes are more fun. As always with strip squeezes, the play requires careful card-reading given the inherent ambiguity that such a plan involves.
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ReplyDeleteComing down to a stiff CK, whether done with or without apparent angst, is likely a serious error.
ReplyDeleteIf you were declarer, what discards would you make on the run of seven spades? Surely, three hearts, two diamonds and two clubs would seem best: your best shot at a twelfth trick is certainly that diamonds split and so you would keep four diamonds (or five, to be mp greedy -- let's disregard that possibility and assume that declarer comes down, after being disappointed that diamonds do not run, to a losing diamond and CAQ). Ergo, you will have no small heart with which to endplay West or to take a heart finesse.
You can either try to endplay East with DT into leading a club from his hoped-for Kx or you can play the CA hoping that West came down to a stiff CK and two hearts. Neither plan works ... UNLESS West has discarded to a stiff club.
last line should have read hoping that "someone" (not just West) came down to a stiff CK.
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