[manudude03]

---

This hand came up in a SIMs night on Thursday. Ignore your choices in the bidding as East, I was declaring it, but it seemed like a pretty interesting problem. What do you lead now at trick 3?

Bonus question if you lead back a spade:

Spoiler

Declarer wins the ♠K, plays ♦K and ♦3 to the ace partner following both times (with 6 then 10) while you pitch say a heart and a club. Declarer now leads a small club off dummy, do you pop up?

[rhm]

manudude03, on 2015-April-25, 09:52, said:

---

This hand came up in a SIMs night on Thursday. Ignore your choices in the bidding as East, I was declaring it, but it seemed like a pretty interesting problem. What do you lead now at trick 3?

Bonus question if you lead back a spade:

Spoiler

Declarer wins the ♠K, plays ♦K and ♦3 to the ace partner following both times (with 6 then 10) while you pitch say a heart and a club. Declarer now leads a small club off dummy, do you pop up?

If declarer has a void in clubs he should be 3♠=3♥=7♦=0♣ and has misplayed the hand, but admittedly this is not obvious.
From declarer's point of view you are marked with the ace of clubs and the heart switch looks like a singleton.
Win in dummy play the king of clubs which East must cover, draw two rounds of trumps ending in dummy, ruff another club, discard one club on the king of spades, ruff a spade and play the ♣J and discard a heart.
West must give you a ruff and discard.
So declarer will not loose any heart trick.
From East perspective no point in assuming the contract to be cold
Accordingly assume declarer to be 3♠=2♥=7♦=1♣
If declarer has the singleton ♣Q you are subject to a simple squeeze in hearts and clubs if you do not cash your ace of clubs at trick 3.

Rainer Herrmann

[ahydra]

My instinct was the CA as well, but something doesn't add up here - if he has seven diamonds, why hasn't South overcalled on the first round? Feels like we're playing for a very specific layout, something like xxx xx KQJ10xxx Q in South (add any of the top spades and surely he bids 3D).

I think I want to know some more about opponents' defensive methods to Multi. Perhaps South thought a delayed X was stronger than an initial X or something. If there's any chance South is 3361 then I want to play a heart for a ruff - though it's odd that he ducked the heart in that case.

Spoiler

From the spoiler declarer now looks like Kxx xx KJ9xxx(x) Q(x) or similar. I don't think it matters therefore whether we take the Ace or not - he has two pitches and only needs one, so we should just fly Ace in case declarer has a singleton club.

(Also should we not have bid 2S rather than 2H, with such great heart preference?)

ahydra

[manudude03]

ahydra, on 2015-April-27, 06:21, said:

I think I want to know some more about opponents' defensive methods to Multi. Perhaps South thought a delayed X was stronger than an initial X or something. If there's any chance South is 3361 then I want to play a heart for a ruff - though it's odd that he ducked the heart in that case.

(Also should we not have bid 2S rather than 2H, with such great heart preference?)

Nothing too fancy, double over 2D would have been 12-15 balanced, with everything else natural. After 2D-P, all doubles are takeout (if 4th seat doubles, it is takeout assuming they have hit the suit).

As for East's first bid, even 2S is pretty feeble imo. The handout we were given suggests that over a multi, East should bid whatever shows a willingness to play partner's suit at the 4 level.

[manudude03]

Full hand:

---

East tried to cash the ace of clubs, leading to an easy 11 tricks.

[PhantomSac]

I completely discounted any layout where partner has led an unsupported ace of a suit dummy has shown shortness in rather than leading his stiff through dummy after I have doubled them in 5D.

I don't feel bad about that decision.

[benlessard]

Also It would help if East bid 2S or even 3S instead of 2H.

[Trinidad]

benlessard, on 2015-May-04, 23:39, said:

Also It would help if East bid 2S or even 3S instead of 2H.

I would bid neither of those, I would get to game.

Rik

[benlessard]

Because of the 2H bid I took 2D as a weak preempt but if they used 2M as something like 5M+5m and 2D could be a decent preempt, than i agree ill make at least a game try.