Friday, February 27, 2009

Plan the play (Matchpoints) in FOUR SPADES, club lead.




Dlr: S
Vul: All




107

KQJ64

K3

AQ107




63

1053

AQ1092

J75



943

A87

J87

K863




AKQJ82

92

654

92




I opened THREE SPADES (I know, I have only six), partner raised me to FOUR SPADES.
Lead was the five of clubs. Plan play single dummy.

I played low, East contributing the King. East returned a club, and it went, nine, seven, ten. I now took TWO rounds of trump only, ending in dummy. I proceeded to cash CA, and CQ taking heart pitches. When it proved that the long trump was with the long clubs, this passed off with noone ruffing in. The lead was in dummy, and I advanced the HK, ruffed out the HA, and drew the last trump. It now seemed promising that the DA would be onside, and indeed when I played up a diamond, West took his Ace, and I was +650 for some almost 80%.

Monday, February 23, 2009

A real life Guard squeeze opportunity for the opps.

Consider the following hand at Matchpoints in 4H,
THe object is to prevent two overtricks.
Or you may pretend declarer is in 6H at rubber.
The full hands:
I was EAST.
S:Q765
H:9x
D:ATxxxx
C:X
**************S:JT98
**************H:xx
**************D:Jxx
**************C:AK98
S:AK
H:AKQJTxx
D:Qx
C:QJ
West , my online partner Jeffrey gets off to the best lead of a trump.
Now do you play or defend?
There is a nice guard squeeze.
Declarer should win and play a club.
East (moi) wins and stops ruff by playing a second round of trump.
Now on the run of the trumps, East's last six cards have to be four spades, one club, ergo guard squeezed in diamonds.
Right?
Pretty hand I thought.

Open Light for once. Partner puts you in slam.



Dlr: S
Vul:




AQ75

9

K42

AKQ64

























T2

AQJ3

A9653

T3


I opened ONE DIAMOND. Partner, ONE SPADE, moi ONE NOTRUMP, partner THREE CLUBS, moi THREE NOTRUMP, partner FOUR NOTRUMP which with this partner is not quantitative. FIVE HEARTS (better go down than breach Blackwood discipline. There are a lot of tombstones of partners who passed FOUR NOTRUMP Blackwood bids.) SIX NOTRUMP.

I await dummy with trepidation, C8 is led. Won in dummy.
After a brief survey, I take a hair raising finesse of HEART Queen. Which holds.
I cash Two more top clubs. They break. Better! We are up to Ten top tricks. I play D2 off the table. DT from righty (who is a King on BBO Online and a gentleman to boot). I duck this, win the heart return with the Ace, and test the diamonds (J87 on my left, QT on my right). Whew.

What was that? 12.6 ish percent? 3-2 diamonds , 3-3 clubs and H finesse?

Unintentional dentist's coup.




Dlr: N
Vul: N/S




1096

A4

J1084

AK54




73

972

AQ752

972



J85

K853

93

QJT8




AKQ42

QJ106

K6

63




Normal contracts were 4 Spades and 3NT from both sides, but I was surprised to get a 100% score in 3NT. I was South. I had done nothing special but see how the play develops.

The bidding had gone ONE DIAMOND - ONE SPADE - TWO CLUBS - THREE NOTRUMP.

T1: D 5, 8 ( I might have played the J) 9, won by K
T2: I played a diamond, West won and shifted to a heart.
T3: East won when I played small from dummy.
I now had +660. Everywhere else either spades were cashed first causing defense no particular trouble with discards, the order of developing H and D also making it easy for defense to cash their three winners (+630), or the hand was declared by north, when you dont get the friendly diamond lead (+630).

So, it seems that when I had just gone about developing additional diamond trick, I had unintentionally cut one defender off from another, given that West did not cash out. At the early stage, West could not know that a matchpoint cashout situation was in the offing.

Sunday, February 22, 2009

Bid,Bid,Bid. It is a bidder's game. SIX DIAMONDS X



Dlr: S
Vul: Nil




753

8762

865

Q109




AKQJ1094

J4

9

A63



862

KQ10953

1072

7




void

A

AKQJ43

KJ8542





This looks like a ghoulash hand, but was dealt on a MP ACBL BridgeBaseOnline tourney.
Sitting in first seat, I opened FIVE DIAMONDS, LHO surprised by this bid an immediate FIVE SPADES. This came around, and I offered partner a choice at the SIX level by introducing my second suit. SIX CLUBS. In retrospect, this would have been the best spot, but when this zany bidding was doubled, partner showed preference to SIX DIAMONDS. This was doubled too. When they did not find the defense of Ace of clubs and club ruff, and instead laid down the wrong ace, I ruffed, drew trump and claimed.

Welcome to Ramesh's BRIDGE BLOG

In these pages, I comment on hands from Bridge Base Online ACBL tourneys. I play in these with a variety of partners with different degrees of skill. I might present a hand or two from my collection of bridge books, every now and then. I am more interested in play and defense than in complex bidding systems, but I do follow the cut and thrust of Vanderbilt and World Championship Vugraph and try to keep abreast of expert practice in the obstructive and constructive bidding system department. I may also feature, newspaper-style, famous hands from important matches that I saw on Vugraph.

NOTE: For JUNE, I am experimenting with adding BBO's Handviewers, which make bridge movies embedded. Just
scroll down beyond the few sampled book covers and you arrive at the blogs that play themselves with the NEXT button. THANKS, BBO!!

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Bridge expert for 20 years. I started blogging about bridge only in 2009. Chess follower. Problem fan. Studied hundreds of composition themes in two-movers, fairy chess, the former from the Good Companion era to the modern style of virtual play. Big collector of chess and bridge rare books. My two game blogs bridge blog, and my chess problem themes blog chess expo

My alter ego, The Hideous Hog

My alter ego, The Hideous Hog

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