The Aces on Bridge: Saturday, March 21st, 2015
I am a mystery wrapped in an enigma wrapped in a pita. Why the pita? That counts as another mystery.
Demetri Martin
| West | North |
|---|---|
| Neither | ♠ 5 4 2 ♥ J 10 9 7 ♦ K 6 5 3 ♣ 7 4 |
| West | East |
|---|---|
| ♠ Q ♥ A Q 8 4 2 ♦ 10 7 2 ♣ K 6 5 3 |
♠ J 10 9 7 ♥ 5 ♦ J 9 8 4 ♣ J 10 9 8 |
| South |
|---|
| ♠ A K 8 6 3 ♥ K 6 3 ♦ A Q ♣ A Q 2 |
| South | West | North | East |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1♥ | Pass | 1♠ | |
| Dbl. | 2♣ | Pass | Pass |
| 2 NT | Pass | 3 NT | All pass |
♣3
In his team’s loss to the Monaco team at the Vanderbilt tournament last spring, Jeff Aker confronted his world champion opponent with an interesting problem. Have a look at the West cards, and see how you would have dealt with it?
Your low club lead goes to the eight and declarer’s queen. At trick two, the heart king appears on the table. Make a play, and a plan. Would you win or duck – and what will you do next?
At the table, West ducked the heart king, then won the next heart as East discarded the club jack. West next led a low club. Declarer ducked the trick, won the next club, then cashed the diamond ace and diamond queen, followed by the top two spades, and put West on lead with a heart.
At this point West could cash his heart and club winners, but then had to give dummy the lead. That meant nine tricks for declarer: three diamonds and two winners in each of the other suits.
The key to the defense is that West has to see the endplay looming. He must win the second heart and cash the heart ace before exiting in clubs. Then he cannot be subsequently endplayed in hearts. This is particularly hard to see, since it appears that you are building tricks for declarer, but if the diamond king is an entry to dummy you will not prevent declarer establishing the hearts.
Your partner’s double is take-out, but does not guarantee perfect shape — he might have only two diamonds or be 3-3 in the red-suits. Still, you do not want to select clubs and miss an eight-card fit. I would bid two no-trumps as a scramble rather than as an attempt to play there, expecting partner to pick his better minor in context. I can then correct three clubs to three diamonds to let him pick a red suit.
BID WITH THE ACES
| ♠ 5 4 2 ♥ J 10 9 7 ♦ K 6 5 3 ♣ 7 4 |
| South | West | North | East |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1♠ | 2♣ | 2♠ | |
| Pass | Pass | Dbl. | Pass |
| ? |
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Bridge-related
Hi Bobby, in BWTA if you “correct three clubs to three diamonds to let him pick a red suit” and you find N with 1-3-3-6 as you say he can be, you’re dead. If he has 4 cards in a red suit, he’ll bid it, isn’t it?
Hi Angelo,
Thanks for allowing a discussion which I should have foreseen.
Yes, partner could be 1-3-3-6 as well as 2-3-3-5, or 1-3-4-5 (with relatively poor hearts, x, xxx, AQJx, AKQxx, but not 1-4-3-5, x, xxxx, AQJ, AKQxx) since he should choose double to start with). However with x, Axx, AJx, KJ10xxx partner should bid 2 clubs first and then double against that particular sequence of bidding, and if so, that partnership (if responding to our BWTA) would then scramble their way to the wrong final contract.
In a search for a partnership’s longest combined trump fit, sometimes such as here, it is an imperfect exercise. However, learning the gambit of the 2NT scramble, since actually playing a NT contract against this bidding is usually impractical and thus allowing that bid to bridge it to an improvement, may be worth discussing. Remember Angelo, from the view of the partner of the overcaller, he may have either 3-6-3-1 or 3-3-6-1 with very little in high cards then making today’s BWTA worth learning.
However, if the opponents were playing 4 card majors (a very common world wide method), perhaps 2NT should be natural. Such are the foibles of what bridge players need to understand, discuss and then attempt to overcome as they progress up the ladder.
Again thanks for your right on comment.
Hi Bobby,
I hate to point it out, but the gremlins are back. West’s rebid must have been 2C (not 1C).
On an unrelated matter, what is your advice for 2NT and the simple cue-bid following a weak-two opening on your right (at pairs, if it matters)?
Hi Mircea,
Yes, sadly the gremlins have returned, but at least we have spotted the enemy and ours is the type setter at the major source, who is, of course, not a bridge player and has now promoted clubs above spades in rank which if so, should allow us to surprise all our opponents at the next tournament by this important change.
Regarding your question, a 2NT bid over an opponent’s weak-two by RHO, should have a relatively large range, 16-18, but including a good 15 (with a reasonable 5 card minor suit AQ10xx or better) or a bad 19 (probably any 4-3-3-3, with poor spot cards, and few, if any 10s or 9s).
A cue bid should be the partnership choice of either regular Michaels (the other major and a minor) as against leaping Michaels (LM), which I prefer, a jump to 4 of a minor would show that suit and the other major. Of course, LM would have to show a better hand (x, AQJ9x, x, KQJ9xx as an example).
Other uses might be asking partner for a stopper in his opponents suit (also, of course used when it goes 2X, P, P, ?) and showing x, Ax, Qxx, AKQxxxx or something similar. Still another use would be any GF, but initially asking for only partner’s best suit: void, KQ10x, QJ10xx, AKQx and trying to avoid partner from passing the double with (what turns out to be an inadequate trump stack, e.g. Jxxxx).
Of course, some others may prefer something I have not heard about yet. (not that I particularly want to).
While playing pairs the only fairly significant difference is that since frequency of gain rather than amount of gain becomes more important, someone can take bigger risks: e.g. holding
s. x, h. Jxxx, d. Axxx, c. Axxx and having LHO open 2 spades passed around in pairs I would definitely reopen with a double, although if my RHO had the same distribution as I, but replete with defense my partnership would, no doubt, either take a large set at the three level or wind up minus a large number from them making 2 spades doubled (although that would be unpredictable) but still in the long run worth taking that risk at pairs, but not in rubber bridge nor IMPs.