West surely slipped here by splitting his D honours. South surely hasn’t got DA10x to play like this although if he has then the suit is blocked anyway. Speed claims another victim I suspect.
Regards
Iain
Bobby WolffMay 30th, 2020 at 7:17 pm
Hi Iain,
Especially for column writing, but also for kibitzers, 1NT and its many faces becomes the hardest to play, defend and (drum roll) to analyze.
No doubt your better defense (West not splitting his diamond honors when declarer leads his “other” one) will, in the fullness of time defeat the contract. However, when the contract is a part score and more importantly, when the play is fast, advantage passes to the declarer since he is always looking at all of his assets, but the poor defenders only can envision half of one and the other half of the other.
You explained it well when you cautioned, speed “kills”, to which West should have slowed down before following with his jack of diamonds, not a low one, to which he eventually paid the price of getting end played.
Proving that if declarer plays quickly and because of that, entices an opponent’s error, it all goes into the record book as a well-played hand scoring up a hand he shouldn’t with a bonus to that declarer of also both getting complimented at the table, but also making a contract he shouldn’t have,
Thanks for catching a critical feature of this hand to which I missed.
Subscribe to our feed
Bridge-related
HI Bobby,
West surely slipped here by splitting his D honours. South surely hasn’t got DA10x to play like this although if he has then the suit is blocked anyway. Speed claims another victim I suspect.
Regards
Iain
Hi Iain,
Especially for column writing, but also for kibitzers, 1NT and its many faces becomes the hardest to play, defend and (drum roll) to analyze.
No doubt your better defense (West not splitting his diamond honors when declarer leads his “other” one) will, in the fullness of time defeat the contract. However, when the contract is a part score and more importantly, when the play is fast, advantage passes to the declarer since he is always looking at all of his assets, but the poor defenders only can envision half of one and the other half of the other.
You explained it well when you cautioned, speed “kills”, to which West should have slowed down before following with his jack of diamonds, not a low one, to which he eventually paid the price of getting end played.
Proving that if declarer plays quickly and because of that, entices an opponent’s error, it all goes into the record book as a well-played hand scoring up a hand he shouldn’t with a bonus to that declarer of also both getting complimented at the table, but also making a contract he shouldn’t have,
Thanks for catching a critical feature of this hand to which I missed.