Hand Evaluation!

[OliverC]

Here's an interesting bidding problem from a hand I played the other day. Opps are Vulnerable. You are not. You're West and have picked up

  8
  AQ75
  AK1086
  A53

LHO deals and after two passes, RHO opens 1 . Your action? 2 - okay I suppose, but I think Double is the standout choice for most people. The bidding proceeds

North     East     South     West
No           No         1          X
2          3        3         4
No           No         4          ??

What do you do? Go for the money and Double your vulnerable Opps or bid one more?

Assessing defensive tricks can be a tricky business at the best of times, but here the bidding really doesn't suggest going for a penalty, even at this vulnerability. You have to trust that Partner has some values for their free bid of 3 , and that suggests that  you and Partner has the majority of the points and probably at least a 9-card Heart fit.

Since NS are competing to game level at adverse vulnerability, the likelyhood is that there is a fair amount of "shape" floating around on this hand, so some of your 4 defensive tricks might not actually be tricks. Safer to bid one more. One enterprising West actually bid two more at this point and ended up in 6 !HX. Partner shows up with

  932
  KJ1094
  Q5
  1086

and was rewarded: South played two top Spades. Declarer ruffed, cashed two rounds of trumps ending in hand and South stupidly let a Diamond go from J97xx on the 2nd round of Hearts, even with AK1086 on view in Dummy. Declarer now ruffed their 3rd Spade, crossed back to the Q and ran all but one Heart, sheedding losing Clubs from Dummy. Now AK and a 3rd Diamond ruffed established the 5th Diamond and the Ace of Clubs still provided an entry to it. Even if you don't bid the slam, 5 is trivially easy.

Who was I? Ahem... Well I was South at a different table. Almost identical sequence except that my LHO overcalled 2 rather than Doubling initially. That gave me the clue that East was more likely to have a Doubleton Diamond and my partner a singleton. Moreover, Partner was marked with length in Clubs and it was probably the only place they could have any points apart from maybe the Jack of Spades, and at this vulnerability I thought they'd probably have more than a 1-count. So I was anticipating almost exactly what they actually had. Over my 4 , West doubled rather than bidding one more which didn't turn out too well for them when we turned up with

J765
862
3
QJ974

opposite

AKQ104
3
J9742
K2

and gathered 10 tricks without any problem for a shared to of nearly 13 IMPs.

It just goes to show that the strategy of taking out insurance by bidding one more rather than doubling and risking a double game swing is usually a winning one.

[kenberg]

With this much offense it seems highly likely that 5 is right.  To twist an old saying from Eddie Manfield, the 5 level belongs to me. 

As to 2 versus X on the first round, I think X is clear. If after 2 there is a preemptive 3 on my left, I am truly stuck. A double at this point would show a good hand, which I have, but it would not show four hearts.

So yes, start with a double, go on to 5 .

Against 4 the lead of the diamond A and then a small diamond toward the Q might make things tough for declarer, but that's not what I would call a likely defense and perhaps declarer can still cope. I haven't thought it through. Ruffing the D and  taking three rounds of trump won't work since they can kill the club suit, but that doesn't mean it can't be made. Anyway, that defense is unlikely.

5 is right.  And easy, even trivially easy as O says, once they start with a spade and another spade. Ruff high , small heart to hand, ruff another spade high, last heart to hand, draw trump pitching a club. As the card lie, playing a fourth heart from hand, pitching another club,  would put serious pressure on LHO, he has to blank his club K rather than toss a diamond to have any hope of holding declarer to 5. Even if he does this declarer can still make 6 but might not.

Bottom line: 5 is a fine contract and unless we see through the backs of cards we do not want to be defending 4 .



An interesting hand. Most are. Not all, but most.

[kenberg]

What do we know, and when do we know it?

Players are told to count. Of course we all should.
And times when we all fall short.

As with most things, some problems are easier than others. I want to use this hand to illustrate.

Dummy
  8
  AQ75
  AK1086
  A53



Declarer
  932
  KJ1094
  Q5
  1086

You are playing 5 and the defense starts with the A and  then the K of spades. What is there to count? Well, we have 9 trump so they have 4. Our KJT9 are higher than any of theirs (maybe not exactly counting, but useful). Ths means that we can, if we wish, ruff high, come to hand by leading a small trump, ruff another spade high, back to hand with a small trump, and then, even if trumps are 4-0 we can draw trumps


Ok, that's counting the trump suit.


We need 11 tricks. Where are they? We can get two spade ruffs, five hearts, three diamonds, one club. 2+5+3+1=11.

That's counting winners.

From this we conclude: As soon as the second spade hits the able from LHO, we are certain of 11 tricks.

I mention this because I frequently see play where a hand simply cannot go down but does. Sometimes I am even the declarer. 

The point is that counting can be tough, here it is not at all tough. For 11 tricks we ruff spades draw trumps, and then, after drawing trumps, we can take tricks in the side suits.


Ok, now suppose we are in 6 . Same beginning: LHO leads  the spade A and the spade K.

We count trump as before and realize we can  play as above. We count tricks and see that we have 11 certain tricks. We need to find  trick number 12. Where can it come from? Surely it must be from diamonds. Two possibilities: Q and then small toward the T, or Q, small to the AK and then ruff a D in hand. The first works if the J is on your left, the second if diamonds are divided no worse than  4-2.  As the cards lie the first line works but the second does not. Otoh, if E holds the Jx of diamonds the second line works but the first does not.


The important point here is that counting your winners has made it clear what you need. You need four tricks in diamonds. You can think of it as needing four tricks in Ds or you can think of it as needing to pitch two clubs, it comes to the same thing.


Now here is one more thing. Again it's not exactly counting but sort of. You have played three of the hearts from your hand. You have:

Dummy
 
 
  AK1086
  A5



Declarer
 
  94
  Q5
  1086


Take a moment. What harm can it do to play another heart, pitching another club? Whether you plan to finesse or play for the 4-2 (or better) split, you can still do it after you lead one more heart.
Of course you might say Ok, it does no harm but what good does it do?

Maybe a lot. Your LHO discarded two spades as you drew the last two trump. His remaining cards are all in the minors. He has to pitch something on this next heart. Suppose he pitches a diamond. You now play the Q and everyone follows. Now just a little more counting. The opponents started with 6 diamonds. You have now seen three, after the pitch and everyone following. You claim. The play is small D to the A, then the D K, then ruff a D with your last trump and you lead a club to the good board.


Would he pitch a diamond? Well, he holds 7 cards. The clubs are Kx. His choice was to pitch a club, blanking his K, or pitch a D.  And he knows nothing of your minor suit holding.  Maybe you have the club Q, maybe you have the diamond Q, maybe you have both, maybe you have neither.  He has to find the right play. There might not be a right play, he might not find it.

So: Looking at the hand at the beginning you see that you can ruff the two spades and draw trump without ever exposing the rest of your hand. That sounds good. You have 11 tricks and two choices for how to get to 12. You play an extra trump and maybe they have a problem. They do.


My main point: Some counting is inferential, some counting is a lot of work, but here you benefit greatly if you  count how many trumps the opponents have and how many tricks you have . Not all counting is equal.  Sometimes it's tough, sometimes it's easy. Start simple.
 

[OliverC]

That is exactly what happened on the one hand where they were in 6 !HX, as I mentioned.


COUNT
ANALYSE
PLAN
KEEP COUNTING
KEEP RE-ASSESSING


... golden rules for Declarer play AND defence


Technique is all very well, but there's little advantage in playing some abstruse squeeze when 30 seconds of counting the hand will tell you that the simple finesse is bound to work and get you more tricks.

[kenberg]

If I can beat this horse just a bit more:

I intended the previous post to distinguish between difficult counting and easy counting. On the defensive side, there was a reasonable opportunity for inferential counting.
After spade, spade ruffed, trump, then

E played another trump and S let go a diamond. Very premature certainly but suppose he pitches a spade and declarer continues just as he did, ruffing a spade, diamond to the Q, and now a third heart from his hand to draw North's last trump.  At this point S must find a pitch. He started with five spades and has pitched one. There was one spade on the board and, after the two ruffs, there is one spade still out. Who has it?  Surely N has it. If E had it he would not have drawn those two trump. Not likely anyway.  After the spade and spade ruff he would attempt to ruff two more spades on the board. Exactly how would depend on his holding, but with 9 cards in the majors his minor suit holdings are apt to provide a route, especially since, as at this point known, he held  the diamond Q. With a stiff club, for example, after ruffing at T2 he could play diamond to the Q, ruff a spade, club A, ruff a club, ruff his fourth spade, he still has a trump on the table. He leads it, draws trump makes his contract, maybe with an overtrick. Even with xx in clubs and Qx in Ds, his worst possible holding when he has four spades,  he can manage to trump three times on the board. He did not even try to do this, therefore declarer did not start with four spades, therefore the pitch of a second spade is safe.


But, to pursue my point, this is an inferential count.  It's tougher.


In the case at hand, as soon as S leads the second spade E can count 11 absolutely certain tricks regardless of any shape, even in the unlikely event that N has a diamond void, and he can see that 12 tricks will depend solely on what happens with the diamonds.  No inference is required, all  of the needed cards are in front of him.  (Or her, of course)

I was hoping that "I can't" would be replaced in a player's mind by "Sometimes yes I can, even if  at some other times it's too tough".

We all have our limits but we need to allow that we can sometimes do better.

The hand is a gold mine of discussion points.

[OliverC]

Indeed!!! (and yes, you're absolutely right. Sometimes counting the hand is easy, but disappointingly most people seem to give up on the idea of working the hand out before they even try).

Case in point:
You're in a lowly contract of 2 and can see the following hands

  J8x
  Kxx
  J97x
  xxx

  Kxxx
  AJxxx
  Axx
  Q

RHO (Std American or 2/1) opened 1 , you overcalled 2 and that ended the auction. LHO leads the 3 . RHO pops up with the Ace and leads back the 4. It's really not rocket science to work out 100% that LHO has led a singleton Spade and is about to ruff the second round. Time and time again, though, I see players who ought to know better playing the king at trick 2 in this sort of a situation.

Even if Dummy had Jx and RHO initially led something like the 6, you can be pretty certain that the 6 was a singleton or high-low from a doubleton. It's almost inconceivable that someone will lead the 6 from Q6 at trick one in partner's suit. They might do it later in the hand if K109x is visible in Dummy, but not as the opening lead, because it's too likely to cost a trick.

This sort of thing is really elementary, and not really even concerned with counting the hand. As soon as LHO leads a Spade, any Spade, it has to be a singleton, because unless Opps are playing Acol (and even then, for many pairs), 1 is guaranteed to be a 5-card suit.

Even at trick 1, there's a fair amount you can infer about this hand:

• West is likely to have 2 Hearts at least (no re-opening Double with 5134 or 5143)
• West is likely to be lower-range (same reason unless they have length in Hearts, but that is very unlikely because it would give East 11 cards in the Minors)
• So if West shows up with the Queen, East is likely to have two of the 3 outstanding Minor suit honours
• West is likely to have longer Clubs than Diamonds
• If East turns up with the Q , the play to the first two tricks hasn't cost you anything (because you'll play for the drop in Hearts)

None of that is really to do with counting, but just thinking about what happened in the bidding and which dogs barked or didn't bark and why.

[kenberg]

Yes, the real question is "What's going on?". Counting is part of it but I think reflecting on the bidding, or lack of it, is often helpful.

In the hand you give, making 2 is apt to be tough. Spade to A, spade back ducked of course but ruffed, club back to the A or K, Q played. You will be losing the first four tricks, and then getting out with one diamond loser is tough. Maybe not impossible but tough. If W holds either the KT  tight or the QT, it can be done. That's not all that likely. Maybe there are other ways, I don't see them . Probably best to hope that W has the club A and is not up for underleading it to his partner's K after his first ruff. That spade 4 at T2 should help him.
 

But down 1 should be ok, they have a nine card club fit. Surely they can make 2 , maybe they can make 3 . 

[OliverC]

 The EW hands were as follows:


West          East
3              AQ764
1098        Q6
Q654        K10
AK983      J1062


So East fortunately doesn't have a quick entry anywhere to give partner a second ruff. East erred in returning the 4 at trick 2. Clearly the 7 asking for a Diamond would have been better, but (having played a low Spade at trick 2) I'm always winning the A , taking 2 rounds of Hearts ending in Dummy and then the Spade finesse on the way back for a Minor suit discard, so 5 Hearts, A and two Spades easy enough.

[kenberg]

I see. Declarer's spades are KT9x.  Now that they cannot get back for the second ruff and hearts are 2-2, you are home, just as you say. Even on a D to the T and the A, two hearts ending on the board and run the j getting 3+5+1+0=8 tricks. They get a spade, a ruff, a club, and 2 diamonds. Yep, it adds up. Old joke: Count your winners and count your losers, if they don't add up to 13 count your cards.

Putting up the K at T2 would be, or for someone was (?),  very costly here. And yes, the ruff of the K is totally predictable as you say. I think sometimes the distinction gets lost between the subtle and the obvious. There are places where, when I look back, I think "I might have considered that". There are other places where i look back and say "How on Earth could I have missed that?".  For the first, reading helps, lectures help, and so on. For the second, it really comes down to self-discipline. Anyone can, if they think about it at all, see that the K will be ruffed. It does not require a lecture to realize that if there are at least  five spade on your right, and if you are looking at seven spades combined in your hand and on the board, then the spade lead on your left is a singleton. This is just a different matter from learning how to play a complex hand.


A thought on the bidding.
It seems to me that W had a negative double over the 2 . It could go wrong, but even if E were 5=2=3=3 he would probably bid 3 over the double.  As the cards lie it is certainly possible to take 9 tricks in clubs against any defense. If declarer, let's say it is E,  is allowed to take two ruffs in his hand that comes to 1 , 1 , 5 on the board, two ruffs. If the defense starts right in on clubs then maybe W needs to play a to the T to get 1 , 2 , 5   and 1 ruff. But killing the ruffs is tough. Even if S makes the inspired lead of the Q at T1 I am not so sure N can get in twice to lead two more. My guess is that 3 does well.

I suppose the main danger of the negative double is that opener might have six spades and rebid 2 . But that might be ok. I think that I would X over 2 with the W hand.  Easy to say looking at all of the cards, of course.

[OliverC]

Yes, The other thing, of course is to chuck the J from Dummy when West ruffs at trick 2, so that the Spades aren't blocked and you can easily take both Spade tricks even if your quick entries to hand in the red suits have gone. Little things like that sometimes make a big difference to how easily the hand plays.

[kenberg]

Corrected and re=corrected post:  I was claiming that dumping the  J at T2 will lead to an overtrick.  Only if they help, but there is a fair chance that they will. After they are in at T2 it might seem right to W to attempt to cash the top clubs. . The Q falls at T3 but that might not dissuade him as people have been known to throw the Q from Qx. If he  continues then ruff, cash hearts ending in dummy, and bring in the spades, tossing dummy's third club. But this works only if declarer pitched the J at T2. It seems fairly likely to me that the play will go that way.

I at least claim I would dump the j in actual play. I also admit I have made some really bad plays at times.

I agree that this is another of those simple things. I can't begin to count how many times I have not unblocked in any of a large number of situations. Maybe I would divide it up this way: Someone who has been playing for any length of time at all should be embarrassed at putting up the K at T2. Any decently experienced player should be embarrassed by not dumping the J. Both are clear errors, but the first is extreme.

[OliverC]

Amen!