[PhilG007]

---

You are South,declarer in 7 ♠ You win the opening club lead then draw two rounds of trumps with the
Ace and King. Your blood runs cold when West shows out on the second round. Incredible! Your side is missing only
one point and it seems it's fated to break your contract. Is there a way of saving the situation?
Your play!

[manudude03]

We need to read the distribution a bit, but the basic idea is to take 2 ruffs in hand, and then keep cashing winners until the 2 card ending where we have QT of spades in hand and the lead is in dummy.

[MrAce]

PhilG007, on 2016-October-24, 08:25, said:

---

. Is there a way of saving the situation?

Yes, you shorten your trumps to the same number of RHO and then start cashing your winners from dummy and eventually he will be forced to ruff.

You may need to guess which suit(s) East is short. As long as E has 2 of each suit, you should be fine.

[Phil]

I don't expect it to be necessarily an honest card but it's good form when presenting a problem like this to mention what club spot was led, as well as what club my RHO played.

But regardless, I continue with two more clubs intending to ruff the 3rd.

Since you posted this in "Interesting Bridge Hands" and not the Intermediate section, I assume that you already realize the key to the hand is shortening our selves twice ending in dummy to grand coup RHO.

So, ruff the club. Diamond over....I need some details on what happens on the 3rd club.

What can go wrong? If RHO is 4342, he discards a heart on the 3rd and 4th club. In this case, I need to switch gears and shorten myself with the heart, and not the club.

If RHO is 4243, I'm probably going down. I could make if I went after hearts, but then I'd fail if RHO were 4342.

Maybe Nigel sees a sure tricks line here...

[manudude03]

Phil, on 2016-October-24, 09:02, said:

I don't expect it to be necessarily an honest card but it's good form when presenting a problem like this to mention what club spot was led, as well as what club my RHO played.

But regardless, I continue with two more clubs intending to ruff the 3rd.

Since you posted this in "Interesting Bridge Hands" and not the Intermediate section, I assume that you already realize the key to the hand is shortening our selves twice ending in dummy to grand coup RHO.

So, ruff the club. Diamond over....I need some details on what happens on the 3rd club.

What can go wrong? If RHO is 4342, he discards a heart on the 3rd and 4th club. In this case, I need to switch gears and shorten myself with the heart, and not the club.

If RHO is 4243, I'm probably going down. I could make if I went after hearts, but then I'd fail if RHO were 4342.

Maybe Nigel sees a sure tricks line here...

I considered saying you should ruff a club, then if they pitch a heart, lead a heart up, lead another club pitching the ace of hearts, and then ruff a heart which seems to cater for all hands where East doesn't have a singleton or void.

[Kaitlyn S]

PhilG007, on 2016-October-24, 08:25, said:

---

You are South,declarer in 7 ♠ You win the opening club lead then draw two rounds of trumps with the
Ace and King. Your blood runs cold when West shows out on the second round. Incredible! Your side is missing only
one point and it seems it's fated to break your contract. Is there a way of saving the situation?
Your play!

The situation is far from hopeless. You need to be in dummy at trick 12 to lead a card with your S-Q10 sitting over East's S-Jx. This will mean you will have to trump two winners in your hand before leading to trick 12, and not allowing East to ruff anything; which means that you would prefer East to follow suit as much as possible rather than giving him a chance to discard in the suit you plan to enter dummy with at trick 11.

Essentially I want to ruff two cards in one suit, then run the other rounded suit discarding diamonds until East ruffs.

So I play a club to dummy and ruff the CQ. I cash the HA and lead the same suit that East discarded to get back to dummy.

Now I ruff the CJ, and get back to dummy with a heart if I have one or a diamond if I don't have a heart.

Now I have in dummy: H-KQ D-KQ and in hand S-Q10 D-A6. Now run hearts, discarding diamonds. If East ruffs, I overruff and claim. If East keeps discarding, I keep leading hearts until I get to trick 12 with the desired ending.

Edit to add: There were zero answers when I started this post, now there are four.

[Phil]

manudude03, on 2016-October-24, 09:10, said:

I considered saying you should ruff a club, then if they pitch a heart, lead a heart up, lead another club pitching the ace of hearts, and then ruff a heart which seems to cater for all hands where East doesn't have a singleton or void.

Yes, I was just about to edit saying the same thing.

[MrAce]

manudude03, on 2016-October-24, 09:10, said:

.......... where East doesn't have a singleton or void.

That is what I said. As long as E has 2+ in each suit you should be fine.

[Cyberyeti]

This is why you bid 7N on these hands, but yes, as everybody has said, you need to reduce your trumps. The other key point is that you want to cash the diamonds as early as you can before E discards his, but need to count your entries to dummy carefully.

[Zelandakh]

As they say in Germany, schlechte Verteiling, Trümpfe verkürzen.

[Zelandakh]

Oh yes, and this could come directly from a low-intermediate level text book. Does it really count as an interesting hand?

[Kaitlyn S]

Zelandakh, on 2016-October-24, 09:58, said:

Oh yes, and this could come directly from a low-intermediate level text book. Does it really count as an interesting hand?

I can virtually guarantee you that none of the students that signed up for an advanced class would make this hand unless they fell into it. I now understand why that many hands that none of my intermediate students and few of my advanced players are in bridge movies in the BBO store marked as "beginner" level.

[Phil]

Zelandakh, on 2016-October-24, 09:58, said:

Oh yes, and this could come directly from a low-intermediate level text book. Does it really count as an interesting hand?

I have a feeling it did come from either a book or a bridge calendar or something. Maybe a Ewart Kempson hand...

Anyway, PhilG, kindly cite the source if this was in fact a pilfered hand.

[PhilG007]

Zelandakh, on 2016-October-24, 09:58, said:

Oh yes, and this could come directly from a low-intermediate level text book. Does it really count as an interesting hand?

That,of course,is a matter of personal opinion

[neilkaz]

Cyberyeti, on 2016-October-24, 09:32, said:

This is why you bid 7N on these hands, but yes, as everybody has said, you need to reduce your trumps. The other key point is that you want to cash the diamonds as early as you can before E discards his, but need to count your entries to dummy carefully.

Why bid 7NT? You only have 39 points. Isn't it more fun to pull off a trump coup while praying that opp can't ruff too soon and then scoring 10 fewer points

[jogs]

neilkaz, on 2016-October-24, 12:49, said:

Why bid 7NT? You only have 39 points. Isn't it more fun to pull off a trump coup while praying that opp can't ruff too soon and then scoring 10 fewer points

For you maybe? I rather have 14 tricks off the top.

[Vampyr]

jogs, on 2016-October-25, 18:15, said:

For you maybe? I rather have 14 tricks off the top.

Why restate Neil's point? His post was funny and yours was not.

[PhilG007]

jogs, on 2016-October-25, 18:15, said:

For you maybe? I rather have 14 tricks off the top.

If all hands were as straightforward like that,then bridge would have lost its
appeal long ago!

[Cyberyeti]

PhilG007, on 2016-November-01, 06:24, said:

If all hands were as straightforward like that,then bridge would have lost its
appeal long ago!

Well 1♠-(insert any bids you want to)-4N-5♣-5♦-6♣-7N you can count a minimum of 14 tricks on top, so this one is not tricky