Reading the Defence

[OliverC]

It's always worth finding out what Opps' carding methods are and trying to "read" what their discards are telling you. This was quite a pleasing hand playing against fairly sophisticated Opps (playing some version of Fantunes) who announced that they were playing "Std count, Upside down attitude and o/e discards". Of course you have to take their signals with a small pinch of salt, because decent Opps will often "lie in their teeth" with their signals and discards, especially if they think that Partner doesn't need to know the truth

You are South, EW Game and you and Partner have bid unopposed to 4

North
AKQ
432
K762
J104

South
1098
AKJ105
Q5
A87

West led the 3 , won in Dummy, East playing the 7.I played a Heart to the Ace and everyone followed small. Just in case there was a ruff happening somewhere (and to confuse the issue somewhat), I now led the Q , hoping to force out the Ace. West took their Ace and continued with another small Spade, win in Dummy, East contributing the 2. I led a second Heart from Dummy and got the bad news with East showed out, discarding the 6 . I inserted the 10 and West took their Queen and played a 3rd Spade, to which all followed (East playing the Jack).

How do you play from here? What do you think is going on on this hand?

.
.
.

Opps had previously shown themselves to be very aggressive bidders, coming in on few values and not very much shape. Given that West had already shown up with the A and Q , and given the discard of the 6 from an original holding of J762 by East, I decide to place the KQ with East. 2 more rounds of Hearts followed. East discarded the 2 on the first, and to encourage him I discarded the 4 from Dummy on the second. East now made a mistake and discarded the 9 on the second Heart. That made my mind up that East was 4144 shape with a start holding of something like 10984 in Diamonds and KQ92 in Clubs. If East is placing me with QJx, it would explain his reluctance to part with a Diamond, because it would allow me to run the Diamonds.

In case I was wrong about the placement of the Club honours, I now exited with a small Club towards Dummy's J10 and East won with the Queen and then played a Diamond to Dummy's King. The Jack of Clubs now brought down East's King and my 8 was good, because of East's earlier discard of the 9.

This wasn't particularly brilliant play on my part. I was playing a hunch based on West already having shown up with 6 HCP, East's first discard and West's insistence on continuing the Spade "attack" rather than playing a second Diamond after taking their Ace. If West had had a Club honour, it might have been difficult very difficult for them to resist taking it when I played a small Club towards the Jack, but East's discard of the 9 had already persuaded me that they had the Club honours in any case.

Making 4 proved to be worth 5½ IMPs because nearly half the field had gone 1 or even 2 off in the same contract. 3NT is a far better contract than 4 Hearts (4 Hearts, 3 Spades a Diamond and the Ace of Clubs) and had made twice.

[kenberg]

There is a lot of food for thought here. Carding issues are subtle, at least I find them to be.  On this reply I will stick with this hand, there is plenty there, but I will post a couple of others as well.

At T1, E plays the 7.  Presumably a count card, showing an even number. Then it goes to the A and the Q. W takes his A and E follows with what? Usually E would give count as they start on their suit, but maybe he doesn't.  Or maybe, with 4 on the board, he is not sure that he cam afford a high card. W plays another and presumably E completes his count signal. Now a from the board.

Uh huh. This is the first chance E has to discard. Does o/e apply? If not, what would be the general rule for when o/e applies and when it does not. The J is an odd card (an 11) so perhaps this asks for a continuation?  On some holdings, this could be what he wants. He might have a holding such that he thinks a passive defense is best and just want another boring spade. So maybe o/e still applies.  Personally, I doubt most would play that it does, but I am not sure.  As with any convention, there is a problem in deciding when it is on/off. In fact he does not at all want a , since after a third declarer can make the hand if he reads the lie correctly. With his KQ9x in , he probably wants a . Declarer will play the J/T, he will cover, and this will at least help. Actually a would be good also, maybe even best, since declarer at this point has only one left in his hand. A lead would knock the K from the board. But E does not know declarer holds only 1 and so I think he is more apt to want be able to ask for a  .

How about old fashioned standard carding? The 7 at T1 is count, given the  high in dummy.  East's second completes the count signal.  Now what of his discard  when declarer leads the second from the board? It's not o/e since the carding is standard. So the first meaning is that the rules required him to play a card and he thought a was best. But the second meaning  would be that, all in all, he thinks there is more of a future in than in . A small suggests .  W still has to allow for the fact that E had to play something and might well not have all that much of a preference one way or the other about the minors.  But he might give some thought to a when the J is pitched, and to a if a low is pitched.

The position can get a little tricky after a lead but the defense can prevail.

O/e is very popular but I am not fond of it. Part of the issue is that while I doubt o/e still applies  here, at East's first discard on this hand,  I am nor sure where the border lies between when it applies and when it doesn't. Another problem is that often at my first discard I have no interest at all in announcing where my strength lies. Declarer gets to read my mail. On this particular hand E indeed has an interest in a suit preference discard, but at least on this hand that  doesn't involve o/e.

[OliverC]

The thing is, Ken, to watch what defenders are playing. Yes, some of their signals will be lies, and some of their plays won't be signals at all. but if you're "blind" to what Opps are playing and what it might mean, then you're playing the hand in the dark.


The other thing about signals is that if you're switched on to what is going on in the hand, it's sometimes a matter of telling Partner what to lead rather than necessarily where your strength lies. The two things don't have to be the same (on some hands, anyway).