A little bit of this, a little bit of that …

“Defended” our team’s runner up finish in top bracket KO at Cape Senior Regional this year.  We played solidly through the series of three-ways leading to the semifinals, winning all four of our matches, including one against the team of all Grand Life Masters (including a recently crowned World Champion) that would defeat us in the finals.  Did not play so well in semifinal but opponents had problems as well and so we did make it to finals, where, unfortunately, we did not play as well as last year, nor, frankly, even well by a general standard.

In one of the three-ways I declared an interesting hand that merits the title of this blog post.

North ♠ Q96xxx ♥ AQJx ♦ xx ♣ x

South ♠ A8 ♥ 9x ♦ Txxxx ♣ AKxx

I was favored with a heart lead from East into my tenace, topping the ten with the ♥Q.  Next I played two rounds of clubs to pitch one of my losing diamonds.  I ruffed a club.  I played a spade to the ace, seeing an ominous ten from West.  I played dummy’s fourth club, pitching a diamond when West followed suit to the club.  East pitched a diamond.  West tried cashing a diamond but I could now ruff the diamond as East played the ♦Q.  I now played the ♥A and ruffed a heart with dummy’s last trump.  I have won eight of first nine tricks and no matter what happens, East will have to ruff in at some time and give me my ♠Q for a ninth trick and +140.  The whole hand was:

Dealer: Vul:	North ♠ Q96xxx ♥ AQJx ♦ xx ♣ x
West ♠ T ♥ Txx ♦ AKJx ♣ QTxxx		East ♠ K7xx ♥ Kxxx ♦ Qx ♣ Jxx
	South ♠ A8 ♥ 9x ♦ Txxxx ♣ AKxx

Why the title of this blog?  All of the following techniques applied to the declarer play:

• Pitching a loser on a winner (the small diamond on the second club winner)
• Trump elopement (ruffing both a small club and a small diamond in the long trump hand)
• Loser-on-loser (pitching the second small diamond on the fourth round of clubs, thus converting a dangerous club ruff into a safe diamond ruff)
• Trump endplay (forcing long trump East on play in order to score up my poorly placed ♠Q).

Just like the song from Fiddler on the Roof: a little bit of this, a little bit of that …