[Fluffy]

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Lead is ♠5 RHO will play ♠Q if you play low and a discouraging ♠7 otherwise


Follow ups: Heart finese loses to ♥Q, LHO returns ♣9

♥A drops ♥Q

♣J will Hold if you try it.

[MrAce]

Fluffy, on 2010-December-12, 15:44, said:

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Lead is ♠5 RHO will play ♠Q if you play low and a discouraging ♠7 otherwise

No need to plan all follow ups, but interested on what would you do on first 2-3 tricks.

I would take ♠ in hand and take ♣ finesse. ♣ finesse will give me better picture about how to play ♥s. If it works ♥A to hand and play small ♥ to dummy's 9 if nothing dropped on A or perhaps AK ♥, also not a bad play if we think W can overruff 3rd ♦.. If i lose ♣ finesse, i can not afford to lose ♥ so i will play E for QJ ♥ starting with ♥ 9 from dummy. If start low ♥ from dummy to our T or 7, we will have to give another ♥ since we have only 1 entry left to dummy and East will cover next turn.

[karlson]

I would just run the heart 9 at trick 2. The line given above seems to risk going down when righty has ♥QJx ♣Qxxx or three hearts and stiff club, and I don't see the gain. (if the heart hook loses, I will cash the A next, then take the club hook, surviving 4-1 clubs if trumps are 3-2).

[MrAce]

karlson, on 2010-December-12, 16:47, said:

I would just run the heart 9 at trick 2. The line given above seems to risk going down when righty has ♥QJx ♣Qxxx or three hearts and stiff club, and I don't see the gain. (if the heart hook loses, I will cash the A next, then take the club hook, surviving 4-1 clubs if trumps are 3-2).

You think west did not lead his stiff ? Perhaps he didn't.

What will you play if ♥ 9 is covered ? You are at the same place whith my line . If you take ♣ finesse now u also go down when east has QJx ♥ and Qxxx ♣ like i do. If u cash another ♥ before ♣ you may go down when ♣ finesse not working but QJx ♥ was on and everything was 3-2.

There are small issues when ♥9 is not covered also, but not important.

I still think your line works better though, when east has 3♥ + stiff ♣, unless an imaginative east jumps his Q or J from Qxx or Jxx on ♥9 Overall i like your line better than mine though.

[dellache]

The best play in Hearts for 3 or 4 tricks is the same : [1] 1st round finesse, [2] then if it failed cash ♥A, and [3] act accordingly. I don't see any reason to reject this play, and I do it at trick 2 ([1] Win Spade in dummy, [2] Run ♥9).

1. If West takes this 9, I will play Clubs for 5 tricks, and play Hearts as stated above.
2. If the 9 takes the trick, I play a 2nd Heart. Say East inserts (best def) and West now discards. Now just play ♣ to the Jack (catering for Qxxx by West) and repeat trump finesse.

[dake50]

Eliminate spades(they are not 1-8). Run H9.
Hope to only lose D:AK +H:Q(J).
My luck dblton H:QJ West.

[karlson]

I admit I didn't really consider rho splitting from QJx. I think it would be a very unusual play and I'd pay off to it (cashing another heart). But maybe I should play a low heart off dummy to discourage it.

[Fluffy]

Whoever tries first round heart finese it loses to ♥Q and ♣9 is returned

Whoever cashes ♥A, LHO drops ♥Q, what now?

Club finese to come tomorrow

[MrAce]

Fluffy, on 2010-December-13, 10:30, said:

Whoever tries first round heart finese it loses to ♥Q and ♣9 is returned

Whoever cashes ♥A, LHO drops ♥Q, what now?

Club finese to come tomorrow

I wrote this but deleted, since it is small target. LHO winning with stiff Q, playing ♣ from Qxxx ? Disabling Karlson from testing ♥ ? ♥4-1 with stiff Q on left and ♣ 4-1 too. Play to ♥ A and Q drop is not a line of my choices. (which is a bad play since you bet all your money on ♣ finesse working, otherwise 2♦+1♣+1♥ losers unless you catch a miracle ♥ holding and guess it right afterwards)

@ Karlson : Splitting from QJx with side Qxxx ♣ is not unusual imo. Because in order to run ♥9 from dummy u need to take first ♠ in dummy. Now defender sees you have only 1 entry left to dummy and thats ♣, he also sees his pd is either void or stiff in ♣, of course he will split. He can also split from QJxx or duck first ♥, i have stories to write for both scenarios.

Also about playing small ♥ from dummy in order to discourage him from splitting, lets say u play small and the righty ducked from QJxx and u won that ♥ in hand. Now what ? Went to dummy with ♣ finesse, which lost to Q, righty played 2nd ♣ to dummy's Ace and covered your ♥ from dummy. Since 1st ♠ is used from dummy u have no more entry to take 2nd ♥ finesse.

[Fluffy]

♣ finese works if you try it.

[dellache]

Fluffy, on 2010-December-13, 10:30, said:

Whoever tries first round heart finese it loses to ♥Q and ♣9 is returned

Whoever cashes ♥A, LHO drops ♥Q, what now?

Club finese to come tomorrow

It may seem against the odds, but [3] I now play the ♣Jack, and when it scores the trick, [4] I finesse in Hearts, playing East for ♠Qxx+ ♥Jxxx ♦Hxx+ ♣x. I'll explain why in a later post. I think this is a close decision though.

[dellache]

dellache, on 2010-December-14, 10:58, said:

It may seem against the odds, but [3] I now play the ♣Jack, and when it scores the trick, [4] I finesse in Hearts, playing East for ♠Qxx+ ♥Jxxx ♦Hxx+ ♣x. I'll explain why in a later post. I think this is a close decision though.

The relevant ♥distributions for West are QJ, Q, and QJx. Unless West is a very imaginative player I doubt he will think about playing the Q at trick 2 with QJx. If we call p the probability that West plays Q with QJx, p is probably very small. Like in restricted choices problems, say West plays the Q from QJ stiff half of the time. The "probability" q that West has the stiff Q is something like q = 1/(1/2 + 1 + 3p). In my estimation on how expert players play, I guess that p << 1/6 so that West in that case will have the stiff Q more than half of the time.

Now for the clubs : unless West has gone nuts, he his not playing the ♣9 from Q9(x) when I could well have KTxxx. So he has QT9(x). And again I doubt he would play back the 9 from QT9 third because in the remote case where pard has Kx and declarer is inspired enough to duck it that would pose an insolvable problem to pard (ducking with Kx ?). I think any reasonable player would play T from QT9 third. What about QT9x ? Now West knows East is stiff/void and the ♣9 looks like a very reasonable play : you can't fool pard, you may score a ruff, and declarer will have something to think about at tricks 3 and 4.

So all in all I play both the Hearts and Clubs to be 4-1.

If West found the very imaginative (and brilliant) defense of (1) taking the Queen with QJx, and (2) playing the 9 back in QT9, he deserves to score his 10/13 imps.

[gnasher]

Quote

If West found the very imaginative (and brilliant) defense of (1) taking the Queen with QJx, and (2) playing the 9 back in QT9, he deserves to score his 10/13 imps.

I don't think it requires imagination to win with the queen from QJx - it's a standard falsecard situation. Unless it's important for East to know where the queen is (for example when West wants a promotion), West should win with the queen half of the time. Still, you're right that most players rarely do this, even though they know they should.

Also, you're overstating what West has to do to beat you. If he has falsecarded in hearts, you will go down regardless of the club layout.

[Fluffy]

I started with a club finese to see how to play hearts, when ♣J held I played ♥A dropping the queen, now it will always make when clubs 3-2. But if clubs are 4-1, then playing ♥K will be fatal if hearts are also 4-1, but it will make when hearts 3-2.

I decided to go for some sort of mixed line playing a diamond, LHO won the ace and gave partner a club ruff, RHP cashed ♦K and exited with another diamond all following. But I had no idea where the lost diamond spot was nor how spades lied, I ended up making the wrong decision in the heart suit.

Does my line have any serious flaw?

[dellache]

gnasher, on 2010-December-15, 03:01, said:

I don't think it requires imagination to win with the queen from QJx - it's a standard falsecard situation. Unless it's important for East to know where the queen is (for example when West wants a promotion), West should win with the queen half of the time. Still, you're right that most players rarely do this, even though they know they should.

Also, you're overstating what West has to do to beat you. If he has falsecarded in hearts, you will go down regardless of the club layout.

Mmmmm...
If LHO doesn't play a Club back : I don't have to guess anymore ♥/♣.
If I guess the clubs to be 3-2 : I don't have to guess ♥(play ♣J, Cash top ♥, go back to dummy if needed).
So let's suppose clubs are 3-2 and West plays the ♣T back : now the problem is a bit different. I have now to weigh QT9x against QT9 and think again about that "standard falsecard situation in trump that experts seldom forget to make".
When the ♣9 is returned QT9 is much more remote, and I reject it.

Actually the ♣9 (instead of the Ten) is a little extra argument to play for the double 4-1 distribution, and if you agree that playing Q from QJx is "standard but rarely achieved", one must take this into account.

[dellache]

Fluffy, on 2010-December-15, 03:13, said:

I started with a club finese to see how to play hearts, when ♣J held I played ♥A dropping the queen, now it will always make when clubs 3-2. But if clubs are 4-1, then playing ♥K will be fatal if hearts are also 4-1, but it will make when hearts 3-2.

I decided to go for some sort of mixed line playing a diamond, LHO won the ace and gave partner a club ruff, RHP cashed ♦K and exited with another diamond all following. But I had no idea where the lost diamond spot was nor how spades lied, I ended up making the wrong decision in the heart suit.

Does my line have any serious flaw?

Hi Fluffy.
I suspected you to have created the dreaded club return by West in the line when you first run the Heart at trick 2 .

Actually when you think about running the Heart 9, you have of course to take the possibility of the club return into account but in practice this really won't happen very often when West has the Q (see other posts). After all, he has a safe (and potentially good) ♠ return. Even then, when he plays a club back, you still have good ressources, and I don't see how you could be in a better guessing position with your line.

Moreover, with your line, it seems you will be forced to guess. With the other line, only the club return forces you to guess.
Another possible flaw is that West might well score an uppercut when he has 5=2=2=4 (I don't know if this spade length is compatible w/ the ♠5 lead though).

[Fluffy]

To Dellache, the club return actually happened on another table, on yet one another table the return was a spade, other tables I polled went down in 3NT and got a ♥Q lead in 4♥. I was the only one to start with a club finese, and the only one to go down in 4♥.