Squeezy Peezy

I was having grand (slam) delusions on this hand from Thursday morning’s club game, when a (new) partnership suffered a bidding misunderstanding.  Partner played 4NT and not 7NT.

Perhaps my thinking about a grand was too much, since my partner’s owning the ♣J was surely not guaranteed and neither is the running of the spade suit, but that slam optimism is sort of normal for me, I admit.  And it can make interesting blog material.  But since he did own both black jacks, 7NT must have looked good.  Still, as another player I know has advised me, when you are within one of your contract, always think squeeze.

The squeeze chances on this hand happen to be extinguished if you receive a heart lead, but assume that you get a more passive lead instead.

Win the spade lead with the jack (or diamond lead with the A; it does not matter which), and run clubs first.  Oops, clubs aren’t running.  No matter, run the other top two clubs, pitching one from each red suit from dummy.  Next your remaining spade to dummy.  Cash the two top diamonds and two more of the spades.  That’s four spades, four clubs, and two diamonds, leaving a three card end position.

Lead dummy’s last spade.  West will keep the club master to discard a heart.  The club card in your hand having performed its job, you can discard the club.  East must keep a diamond and so will discard his second heart.  Voila!  The double squeeze works and the ♥2 in dummy (surely, you showed off by discarding the ♥6 on an earlier spade, right?) will win Trick 13 after the ♥A takes Trick 12.

A simple squeeze earned us a poor score on another board.

I am not a fan of the 2NT call or the 3NT call, but then no one asked my opinion.  And I wouldn’t have been so aggressive as to have led the ♥4 either, but again no one asked my opinion.  Besides, who cares, since I was the goat on this hand anyway?

Pard did lead the ♥4.  Looking at the ♥2 in dummy and the ♥3 in my hand, I could ascertain that pard was leading from a four card suit, most likely one that is missing the ♥A.  For some reason, I thought it might help our side if I could hide the 4-4 heart split from declarer.  So thinking, I won the ♥K and returned not the standard ♥3, but a deceptive ♥7.  (This is unlikely to fool partner, who would be unlikely to think that this opponent had bid 2NT when holding a four card heart suit.)  Partner won the ♥Q and then surprised me by next playing the ♥A and then his fourth heart.  So much for my deception.  Reasonably enough, pard exited with a diamond.  Two more diamonds followed, then a spade to declarer’s ace.  I could see that I had to protect spades and so had no problem discarding clubs (first the ♣K)  on the ♦J and then ♦Q, but when declarer proved to own the ♣8 (dummy’s four clubs had been played on the third and fourth rounds of hearts, the first round of clubs and the fourth round of diamonds), -400 was my score.

Partner quickly saw that I could have broken the squeeze by leading a club before I played my heart (and, less understandably, so could have he), but I was not thinking that declarer had no heart stopper and, frankly, never even considered switching to a club.  I choose to blame partner.  No, not for his not switching to a club before cashing out the heart suit – his play looks reasonable to me – but for his not having been dealt the ♣8.  How much is that to ask from the guy?