How about leading the club king at trick 2? West ducks (best defense), so you lead a club to dummy at trick 3. Again West ducks (best), so you lead a spade. If East pops the ace, you have 3 spades and 2 tricks in each of the other 3 suits. If he ducks, win the king and clear hearts. West can win a heart, the ace of diamonds & 2 club tricks, but you have the rest, since west has no spade to get to his partner. It seems to me this is better than the suggested line, since that would lose if west’s singleton spade was the 8 or 9.

I’ll take a swing at this one. I think the problem is that East doesn’t play the AS, but inserts the nine instead. So you take the trick in hand and now what? If you play a third club, West takes that and cashes his fourth club before clearing diamonds. West is now free to discard diamonds as the AS completes the defense book and the JH becomes the setting trick.

Hmmm, looking again, I don’t think my way works. Take the spade, clear hearts and the defense doesn’t have a way to cash the AS. Whoops. Back to the drawing board.

OK, apologies to David, I should not write things when I am sick. 🙂 I just re-read your original post and you already addressed all this.

Hi David and also Jeff,

Yes David, your line is likely the best line, but what about if hearts do not break 3-2 or clubs also turn out to be 5-2 making West: 1-2-5-5.

Did East, Lauria, make the wrong play when he hopped with the Ace of spades, no doubt trying to guess the distribution, but at the same time making a time honored defensive play of protecting his partner’s entry for eventually providing the setting trick? Did I need to have KQJx of spades rather than only the KQx especially if I held 4 hearts (he might have felt vulnerable holding only 2)?

As Jim2 might have said (or is saying now) “my head hurts from all the possibilities”.

These types of discussions are important, if only to emphasize how difficult defense sometimes becomes in high-level confrontations, when there is little time to think and declarer, not the defense, is blessed with viewing all of his 26 assets before he embarks on his plan.

😉

Actually, it should probably be noted, David, that – per my reading – Mr. Wolff’s line would have been playing the 8S on the SECOND round of spades, not the first.

Thus, West would already have played his singleton on the first round.

Yes, Jim, but only because East played the spade nine on the first round; if he plays low on the first round, South must play the eight, losing to the (hypothetical) singleton 8 or 9 in West’s hand.

Ah, your point then was that – should East play low on the first round and South put in an honor – East could prevent South from scoring the 8S by splitting from the 109 on the second round.

I see that now. Good catch.

This has not been mentioned – it appears that the bidding is 90 degrees out of sync. Nothing makes sense otherwise.

Is there a typo in the answer to the bidding quiz? Partner may have a singleton club and 4-4-4-1 shape? I haven’t read this blig that long, but I doubt that Mr Wolff advocates opening one club with a singleton club. I assume he meant singleton spade.

Hi Jeff H,

Yes, there is a glaring mistake in the BWTA and it is as you guessed, the 4-4-4-1 shape should have been 1-4-4-4.

Sorry for this and no excuses, just poor organization. Also with 1-4-4-4 shape it is usual practice to open 1 diamond, not one club, unless the clubs are far superior to the diamonds.