There was a hand last night that presented in interesting play problem. I'll put declarer's hand at the bottom.
Q9763
Q64
KT7
Q7
AK2
A7
Q65
AT982
Rho deals and opens 1
, we overcall 1NT, the opponents now remain silent. Partner transfers to spades and then invites with 2NT. We happily accept with 4
.
The opening lead is the
J.
I suppose we could make up wild distributional hands that were opened light but would assume, correctly, that Rho holds the
A, the
A, and the
K. Maybe one or both of the unseen Jacks, or maybe not.
Declarer succeeded but he expressed concern about the
J for his line of play. He drew three rounds of trump ending on the board, then led the
Q covered by the K, taken with the A, and then another
. The J was on his right so all is well. He can get back to his hand with a
and has plenty of tricks. The opponents can cash the
J or K at T2 and the two red aces when they wish.
However as declarer noted, it could have been Lho who had the
J, in which case he takes it and leads another
, and the opponents get a
, two
, and the
A.
What to do? Given the assumption that the
A [Oops, the
K, see reply below], the
A, and the
K are with Rho, I think we can bring this in whenever there is no singleton or void in any suit in either hand, and assuming that the
lead was not a doubleton (which would be bizarre). That seems like not too much to ask.
I will leave a little room in case you want to think about it.
Ok, here is what I think works. Our goal is to establish clubs, three club ricks will be enough, and we want to do it w/o letting Lho in.
So win the
at T1 and lead the
2, playing the 7 unless Lho plays the J. So Rho is in, either with the J or the K, you don't care. He presumably will not cash a red ace so he returns black card, let's say a trump. Win on the board and lead the
Q. If Rho played the K at T2 then of course this Q will hold. But even if if Rho won at T1 with the J, he still cannot cover the Q with the K else the entire club suit runs. Ah. Now two rounds of !c have been played, we have won the Q, we still have the A, and we will set up one more club. Draw trump ending in hand, ruff a
on the board, establishing the suit, and lead a
from the board back to your hand. We take five spades, one heart one diamond, three clubs. That's ten.
Seems to work, at least I think so. If there is a gap (other than the prescribed conditions) I have not been able to see it. I sort of like the idea of starting a suit with small to the 7.
