Jeff Lehman

Marshmallow Revenge

I am betting I won’t receive any sympathy, but I am trolling nonetheless.

At a club IMPs pair at fav vul, I hear my partner open 1.  I hold:

N
North
98
A8
J9753
AK43

 

Shockingly, I hear my Flight C RHO overcall 2NT (unusual, for minor suits)… this, at vul v not.  I double … and, even more shockingly, I hear three passes follow!

I lead a spade.

 
N
East
KQJ762
Q10932
4
10
W
North
98
A8
J9753
AK43
9

(Pay no attention to the “N” and “W”, the full names of “East” (dummy) and “North” (I) are correct.)

I see the king in dummy won by partner’s A, and declarer pitches a club.  Partner now plays the Q!  Wanting a diamond switch, I discouraged by playing my smallest club.  Partner gets the picture and now continues with A and Q, the latter won by declarer!!

What is going on here?  Declarer has no more high cards in her long suits than the K and the J.  As declarer thinks and eventually plays a small heart, what are your thoughts?

 

 

Well, mine were that while no matter what declarer had, she made an insane bid, I am going to place her with something more than 5-5 distribution.  The play to date is consistent with her holding –, Kx, KT862, Jxxxxx.  So thinking, I rise with the A to shut her from two good spades in dummy, and plan to cash two high clubs and then play a third club to lock declarer in her hand, where she can cash good rounded suit cards, but then must lead a diamond from T86 into my J97 as we take turns being endplayed and I rack up a neat +800.

Following plan, I rise with the A and cash the K, partner following.  But when I play my A, partner follows with the J!  What, declarer actually is 0=3=5=5?  At this point, we have no tricks beyond my good J.  Discombobulated (no, I am not asking for sympathy for this play!), I neglect to cash the J, and manage to arrange to hold ourselves to +200.  Meanwhile, had I exited with a small club after winning the A, we could have gotten +800 that way!

 
22
E-W
South
N
North
98
A8
J9753
AK43
 
W
West
K74
K10862
98652
9
E
East
KQJ762
Q10932
4
10
 
S
South
A10543
J65
AQ
QJ7
 

 


4 Comments

RobinDecember 10th, 2012 at 3:20 am

Actually, and this is going to surprise you Jeff, I have a huge amount of sympathy for your analysis.

However, before we get to that, you haven’t said what your score on this board was, so I’m not sure if you actually need any sympathy. I don’t really see you making game on these cards so, correct me if I’m mistaken, but +200 should probably be a pretty good score.

While I understand you wanting to discourage partner from continuing clubs, no signal should be considered a command. From partner’s perspective he should know that you will discount the possibility of him having started with QJx so I think he should try one more club (the J) before acceding to your diamond preference.

That way you will still get your 800 (four clubs, two diamonds and two major aces).

Jeff LehmanDecember 10th, 2012 at 4:45 am

+200 was well above datum. However, since this was cross-IMPs scoring, failure to get 500 (or even 800) is quite costly.

RobinDecember 10th, 2012 at 3:23 pm

Ah, I hadn’t realized it was IMP pairs.

RobinDecember 10th, 2012 at 3:23 pm

… though I see now that you did state that at the top.

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