[andrei]

IMP's, good opponents

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First 3 tricks:

2♠ - A♠ - K♠ - 4♠
A♦ - 3♦ - 6♦ - 4♦
2♦ - J♦ - Q♦ - K♦

What now?

[gszes]

SPADE

Why would declarer risk playing diamonds before pulling trump? IMHO it is because they need to give the opps a reason to make a mistake. Declarer may easily have solid hearts and a spade loser knowing that if they pull trumps first then go after diamonds a spade continuation is the only hope for the defense. BUT if they go after dia first maybe a defender will try almost anything other than a spade and they will waltz home. There is little reason p cannot have begun life with KQJx vs KQJxx for that 1s overcall and the LOP seems to indicate something weird is going on. Picturing declarer with something like 2623. Your partner loves to show top of sequences and at times it is an advantage:)

[robert2734]

DIAMOND

Even if declarer has a losing spade it can't go away on the diamonds. If declarer was 2-5-5-1, he could pitch it on the clubs but he would have already done so. Why did partner play 3-J of diamonds? Would he do that with a doubleton? Would he do that with JT3? Say declarer started with QT965 of diamonds and they are now good. Declarer didn't know the jack would drop and the diamonds would set up. So now we play partner for the queen of hearts hopefully doubleton but even singleton if declarer misguesses the position and doubleton diamond. If declarer is trying to reach his hand to take a club finesse 2-2 in the black suits, I say we let him.

[ahydra]

Needs more info:
- what was 2S and 3S?
- What signal does the play of ♦3 then ♦J ostensibly convey?
- Is partner the type who would make an overcall at this vul on KQJx?
- Did partner have a way to show a black two-suiter over 1C?

Absent more information, I think I'm with robert2734 on this - the play of the diamond J does suggest declarer is 1552, so we play him for x 9xxxx Q1098x ?x (partner has to have the HQ for us to stand a chance). Not sure why he didn't cash the HA before playing on diamonds though.

ahydra

[andrei]

ahydra, on 2016-February-21, 14:55, said:

Needs more info:
- what was 2S and 3S?
- What signal does the play of ♦3 then ♦J ostensibly convey?
- Is partner the type who would make an overcall at this vul on KQJx?
- Did partner have a way to show a black two-suiter over 1C?

2S and 3S - undiscussed
partner ♦ play - it can be from J3 or JT3
It is possible, but not very likely
Yes

[SteveMoe]

Opener looks to be 1=4=3=5. Trump cuts ruffs.

[mgoetze]

No, it is not obvious to me (what 2♠ means), therefore I ask. Honestly, if opps look anything like a regular partnership, I'm not accepting "undiscussed" as an answer either, and call the director.

[Cyberyeti]

SteveMoe, on 2016-February-23, 16:12, said:

Opener looks to be 1=4=3=5. Trump cuts ruffs.

Opener is dummy, if you mean declarer, that means partner played 3J from a 4 card holding which seems very unlikely. 1453 or 1444 seems more likely.

If I had ♠KQJx, I'd probably play the J under the A, which with the 9 on the table really can't be anything other than KQJx

[wanoff]

Playing normal count round here it's K from KQJx and x from KQJxx.

[Cyberyeti]

wanoff, on 2016-February-25, 04:50, said:

Playing normal count round here it's K from KQJx and x from KQJxx.

I disagree, K (and even more so Q) convey special messages here. When you've bid a suit so can't be short, Q says I have QJ10..., so K and J are the cards that say I have KQJ, one is odd, one is even count. To me K is the normal card to play without count implications so deviating is the equivalent of high-low.

[kenberg]

totally withdrawn!!!
I had mistakenly thought the contract as 4H and finally found a very unlikely but not totally impossible way to set it, making very hopeful, assumptions. Now back to the real world. Fantasy is more fun.

[robert2734]

Declarer is in six hearts and has already lost the king of diamonds. If his contract is cold it is cold. If he has a black loser he has a black loser. A diamond lead only hurts if it gives up a ruff sluff, the infamous 2-6-2-3 my spade opponent points out. A diamond lead helps if partner has the queen of trump. Even if he has more diamonds, declarer could still ruff high.

Declarer play make sense to me if he has long diamonds he thinks he has to ruff out. He doesn't know the jack of diamonds will drop and the suit sets up. Otherwise he would draw trump first.

[kenberg]

robert2734, on 2016-February-25, 12:49, said:

Declarer is in six hearts and has already lost the king of diamonds. If his contract is cold it is cold. If he has a black loser he has a black loser. A diamond lead only hurts if it gives up a ruff sluff, the infamous 2-6-2-3 my spade opponent points out. A diamond lead helps if partner has the queen of trump. Even if he has more diamonds, declarer could still ruff high.

Declarer play make sense to me if he has long diamonds he thinks he has to ruff out. He doesn't know the jack of diamonds will drop and the suit sets up. Otherwise he would draw trump first.

Thank you. I was looking at this, thought is he in 6H, and thought I checked it. Bad mouse, bad mouse! Blame it on the mouse.
Thank you.

I knew there was a reason I had not said what I said earlier!