Dare to acol

[kenberg]

Yesterday's Dare, Board 2, defense:

The uncontested auction begins on your left
1 - 1
1 NT - 3NT

This being acol, that 1NT rebid is like an opening 1NT in std 2/1.

Partner leads the J

Dummy hits, shown to the right,  you hold, as shown below:
                                        AJ83
                                        QT
                                        KQ95
                                        853

        K62
      KJ3
        8643
      742

A small from the table, taken by the Q (at our table taken by the A but taken by the Q is better I think).
Declarer leads the Q, pard shows an odd number of cards, declarer plays low from dummy, let's say you forget the duck and take your K. Now what?
Suppose the object is to set the hand, overtricks and undertricks are ignored.
Now what?

I considered a small . If pard has the A we get 3 tricks. But surely declarer then has the rest.

Ah, but this is acol. There is no way I was going to find the setting switch to the J even if I did remember this is acol, but it would have worked.

Parter holds A972
So: J to the A, 2 to my K, and now a third to pard's 97, declarer holding 86.

no, I am not doing that.


Still, I thought I would post the hand. We will be playing against the acols on Ap 3 and it is good to keep in mind how they bid.

Acols open four card majors. Goren opened for card majors but even Charlie did not open 1 on 8654. Apparently acols do.

Something to keep in mind, although not dwell on, for Ap 3.

Btw, I duclke the first after which declarer had a clear 9 tricks. But even if I took the first I was not switching to the J.

[wackojack]

Yes I think this is an entirely artificial problem

I was sitting with the hand holding    KJ3  and that was South.  I ducked smoothly and was already thinking could declarer have 4 small hearts and was working out what holding in hearts would declarer have to have to defeat the contract.  However declarer never tried the finesse and just took his 9 tricks. 

The answer is that if declarer has 8xxx then I can lead the K and follow with the Jack and partner cannot go wrong.  If however, declater has 9xxx not holding the 8 then I must lead the J.  Too much for me, I was preparing myself to lead the K .

And oh!  This hand is unusual in that the only 4 card suit is hearts and so would be opened a heart.  However, some Acol players with a balanced 4M +4m in tthe 15-19 range would bid up-the line just like in SA many with 12-14 and 4M+4m would bid up-the -line (and not rebid 1N).  So Acol is as different as SA in that respect.