[aleatory]

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Please feel free to comment on the bidding but I'm more interested in the play.
spade lead.
if u draw trump, west shows out and discards spades all 3 rounds
if u play another trump, east throws spade after hesitation, u pitch diamond, west also another spade.
Now things look something like this:

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assuming west started with 8 spades, he has 5 red cards and 3 spades left. east has 8 red cards.
How do you figure the highest percentage play from here, or is it just a guess?
if u play another trump, east plays heart. whatever u discard, west throws another spade.

[MrAce]

Which spade was led? And where did my ♠ K go?

[aleatory]

fixed.
7♠ led to 9 and Q. later east discards the 6♠

[MrAce]

aleatory, on 2014-September-19, 16:09, said:

7♠ led, king from dummy. later east discards the 6♠
I was actually not declarer this hand but I guess playing the king on first trick is lol bad? Surely west has AQ(J)xxxxx so does it matter?

No it won't matter on this hand I believe, unless one decides to play W for QTx ♦, then playing the ♠K distributes ♠ thread to both opponents, while keeping the K in dummy forces W to stick to his A and can not hold both ♠A and QTx♦ at the same time. But we probably won't play for this anyway. Reason I was interested in the spade spots on lead and the spade discard by E, is obviously I am trying to get a clue about how spades are split.

[MrAce]

Basically if I think W started with 8 spades + 0 clubs I would cash all 3 hearts (remaining in N)

-If W follows all 3 hearts that marks him at best 2 diamonds, then i will take the finesse
-If W folows only 2 hearts, I still will take the finesse

-If W shows out on 2nd ♥, I will play for the guaranteed squeeze regardless of who holds the Q or T(Note that I do not need W to hold both Q and T of diamonds to squeeze him. Yes I will have to bare the ♦ KJ in dummy but when W shows out on 2nd round of hearts, that marks E with 2 spades+6 hearts+3 clubs ---->at most 2 diamonds

♠xx
♥Jxxxxx
♦Tx or Qx or xx
♣xxx

If we believe that W had originally 7 spades, and E led 7 from T87 or J87, keeping the ♠K in dummy can be vital (now I see you edited the OP and kept ♠K, which is better imo) Then you can apply the same test on ♥ suit;

-If W follows all 3 hearts, he has at best 3 diamonds, finesse is better.
-If W follows only 2 hearts, he has at least 4♦, guaranteed squeeze regardless of who holds the Q
-If W follows only 1 ♥ same as above, squeeze the ***** out of him!

EDIT: This is probably more appropriate problem for I/A forums imho.

[mikeh]

You can decide to play the 4♠ bidder for the diamond guard, and thus try to generate the end position in which dummy holds the stiff spade K and KJ in diamonds, with declarer holding A9x in diamonds, and West having to hold the spade A and Q10x in diamonds.

This also works any time West has any 4 diamonds, and that is a clue as to how you play the hand. If he has 4 diamonds, he will be very short in hearts.....maybe 8=1=4=0.

So: ruff the spade lead, draw 2 trumps, ending in dummy, and ruff a small spade high, checking in case spades were 9-1.

Then pull trump and play one, just one, more round, pitching a diamond. The purpose of this is to give east a chance to make a silly error...throwing a 3rd, 'useless', spade if he holds it. Of course, that spade is far from useless. Pitching it gives you a perfect count, while holding it, if he has one, will likely lead you to place West with 8 of them.

Having cashed the 4th trump, play 3 rounds of hearts ending in hand, so that you can run the rest of the clubs if a squeeze looks like the right line.

This will give you an excellent inferential count. It is inferential because you don't have a true count on spades...you infer they are 8-2 from the auction, the 2 spades played by east and the failure to pitch a 3rd one, which inference is very weak against a competent player.

If West shows out on the 1st or 2nd heart, you place him with long diamonds, and play the squeeze.

If West follows to 2 hearts, then diamonds are, inferentially, 3=3. You can still opt for the squeeze but you need West to be Q10x, while the finesse needs east to have Qxx or Q10x, so the odds are heavily in favour of the finesse.

If West follows to 3 hearts, then the odds are heavily in favour of the finesse since diamonds are probably 4-2, with east holding 4.

The important lesson to be learned is that one should, when possible, try to count out the hand before deciding what lie of the cards one will play to exist.

Edit: I wrote this and had it in preview mode when the phone rang, and posted it on hanging up, only to see that Timo was ahead of me...sorry about that.

[MrAce]

mikeh, on 2014-September-19, 17:05, said:

Edit: I wrote this and had it in preview mode when the phone rang, and posted it on hanging up, only to see that Timo was ahead of me...sorry about that.

No, actually your explanation is better than mine, since you mentioned "to ruff a small spade" from dummy. Which makes things much more clear.

[aleatory]

Thank you both. I could see the squeeze if west had 4 diamonds but thought maybe I was missing something when they break 3-3 and neither of them pitch a diamond early.
The point about ruffing a spade early to get a better picture of the spade count is good.