Opportunity Knocks

December 14th, 2008  ~  mark horton  ~  No Comments 

From the Juniors in Beijing

Dealer North   East/West Game

	Q 6 5 4
	A K Q J 6 3 2
	A
	10
J 8		A 9 3
7 4		8 5
Q 7 6 5		K J 10 2
K J 9 7 2		8 6 5 3
	K 10 7 2
	10 9
	9 8 4 3
	A Q 4

West	North	East	South
	1	pass	1
pass	4	pass	4
pass	4NT	pass	5
pass	6	all pass

When North splintered in support of spades South, with two useful cards, decided to fabricate a cue bid in diamonds. That was enough for North to drive to a slam that depended on how declarer tackled the trump suit.

West led a diamond and declarer won, played a club to the ace and a trump (taking the suit in isolation the seven is the technically correct card, but there are other issues here – a possible 4-1 trump break and the possibility that dummy might be forced) for the eight, queen and ace.

East switched to a heart and declarer won in dummy and played a spade, East following with the three.

If declarer goes up with the queen the slam roles home, but when he finessed the ten it lost to the jack and he was one down.

If declarer discounts the possibility of trumps being 4-1 (East might have forced the dummy with a diamond after taking the ace of spades) then West’s possible holdings in the trump suit are 98 or J8. With the former West might equally have played the nine on the first round of the suit, so there is a case for declarer to play the king on the second round.

One last thought – suppose East follows to the second round with the nine of spades?  Should declarer play him for AJ9 or A93?

Play or defend?

December 9th, 2008  ~  mark horton  ~  No Comments 

This deal from the Keohane North American Swiss Teams features two of the leading teams. After taking a look at the bidding try to decide if you would like to be the declarer or the defenders:

Dealer: West Vul: N/S		North
		♠	K J 8 4 3
		♥	A K 6
		♦	A J 5
		♣	A 5
West				East
♠	10 7			♠	Q 9 6 5
♥	J 3			♥	8 7 5
♦	8 7 2			♦	Q 10 9 3
♣	Q 10 9 8 7 2			♣	K 6
		South
		♠	A 2
		♥	Q 10 9 4 2
		♦	K 6 4
		♣	J 4 3

West led the ten of clubs and when declarer put up the ace East dropped the king.

Now, declarer cashed the king of hearts, crossed to the queen of hearts and then played three rounds of spades ruffing in his hand with the ten of hearts. Declarer drew the last trump and played a spade. With East apparently marked with a singleton club declarer discarded a club on this trick, expecting East to be endplayed.

Not quite, as East now produced a second club to defeat the slam.

If East had retained the king of clubs, then declarer, aided by the double of 5♣ would have ruffed the last spade then exited with a club to endplay East.

Declarer missed an opportunity. At trick 7 he should exit with the jack of clubs! West has to win and now declarer can ruff a club in dummy and also establish a spade trick while there is still an entry to dummy (the ace of diamonds) to enable him to enjoy it.

For the record, 6♥ can be defeated, but only if West finds the remarkable lead of a diamond!

Guess the bid – conclusion

December 6th, 2008  ~  mark horton  ~  1 Comment 

Do you recall the classic Marx Brothers movie A Night at the Opera?

It includes the following exchange between Groucho and Chico (along with Harpo keen bridge players):

Groucho: “That’s in every contract, that’s what you call a sanity clause.”

Chico: “You can’t a fool a me there ain’t no sanity clause”

Now try your hand at this simple quiz and you may begin to understand why I have mentioned it.

You have the following hand as West at game all:

Your mission, should you decide to accept is to guess what West decided to bid.

This is how a number of players approached the problem – and the comments of the questioner:

It was only then that light generally dawned – West overcalled 2♦ (no doubt intending to introduce his clubs on the next round). When North rebid 2♥  East (holding ♦AK doubleton) raised to 3♦ and South’s bid of 4♥  (which was easily made) ended the auction. (It was flat board.)

When we observed to our informant that publication might lead to the termination of his partnership his reply was:  ‘Print it.’

Guess the Bid

December 3rd, 2008  ~  mark horton  ~  5 Comments 

Do you recall the classic Marx Brothers movie A Night at the Opera?

It includes the following exchange between Groucho and Chico (along with Harpo keen bridge players):

Groucho: “That’s in every contract, that’s what you call a sanity clause.”

Chico: “You can’t a fool a me there ain’t no sanity clause”

Now try your hand at this simple quiz and you may begin to understand why I have mentioned it.

You have the following hand as West at game all:

Your mission, should you decide to accept is to guess what West decided to bid.

COMING UP (CAM)ROSES

February 12th, 2008  ~  mark horton  ~  1 Comment 

Although England eventually inflicted a severe defeat on the Contract Bridge Association of Ireland team in the first of the two Camrose Trophy weekends, it was their opponents who took the lead on the very first deal of the match when they delivered a perfect natural auction to a slam missed at every other table:

There were two key bids, the first being North’s jump to two spades, which established a game-forcing situation. The second came when, having given preference to clubs, Mark Moran appreciated the potential importance of his singleton diamond and took the opportunity to cue bid four diamonds. When he bid five clubs over North’s cue bid of four hearts, Peter Pigot realised that his partner’s trump support must be significant and went on to the laydown slam. If they go on to collect the IBPA award for the best bid hand of the year, those Irish eyes really will be smiling.

Spingold report Part 2

October 4th, 2007  ~  mark horton  ~  No Comments 

There was only one double figure swing in the second quarter of the match:

By the time South bid 3NT he was known to hold a huge balanced hand, so North made a general try with 4NT.

South won the spade lead, cashed the top hearts and played a heart. West discarded a spade and declarer ruffed and advanced the ♦Q, covered by the king and ace. He ruffed another heart, cashed the ♣A and ran the ten to West’s queen. He took the diamond return in dummy, ruffed a diamond and claimed, +920.

This time North-South had a major accident in the bidding. South clearly thought they were playing Kokish (where 2♥ is either hearts or a 25-26 point hand) so he had shown a balanced hand, but North

obviously thought his partner had a heart suit.

West led a diamond to the queen, king dummy’s ten and East’s queen. He won the diamond return in dummy, cashed three rounds of hearts followed by three rounds of spades and two top clubs. Then a third

club cashed for 11 tricks, +450, but 10 imps for Cayne.

Versace and Lauria were East-West for the Cayne team, but we’re not sure who’s in which seat. Against 5♦, East led a spade and declarer played a dummy reversal, ruffing spades, drawing trumps, and then attacking clubs, scoring six trump tricks, four clubs and the ♥K, an amazing +550.

South led the ♦J. North took the first two tricks and exited with a spade. Declarer drew trumps and led a club to the ace, North dropping the queen! He ruffed a club, North playing the king! Now he

crossed to dummy with a spade…

At this point if declarer ruffs a club and then plays a spade to dummy, he squeezes South. If South pitches a heart, declarer can play ♥A, heart. If South pitches the 10, declarer can exit with a club, endplaying south.

On the system card I saw North’s 1NT was 12-14 and he had already shown up with the ♠J, ♦A-Q and ♣K-Q, so he could not have the ♥K. Perhaps then declarer should have found the winning line. As it

was, he took a heart finesse and was one down, -100. But he still won 10 imps!

Mark Horton is a professional player/writer.

Enquiries can be sent to him at Markhorton007@hotmail.com

Spingold report Part 1

October 4th, 2007  ~  mark horton  ~  No Comments 

Here are some highlights from the Spingold Teams at the ACBL summer nationals in Nashville.

All Quiet on the Eastern Front

The first set of the Round of 16 match between Cayne (the #2 seed: Charlie Weed NPC, James Cayne and Michael Seamon, playing with Italians Alfredo Versace and Lorenzo Lauria, and Fulvio Fantoni and
Claudio Nunes) and Mahaffey (the #18 seed: Jim Mahaffey and Mark Lair, playing with China’s Zhao Jie and Fu Zhong, and Sweden’s Fredrik Nystrom and Peter Bertheau) was a low scoring affair (27 to 14), but there were many points of interest. This deal shows how keeping quiet can sometimes be effective. At one table East overcalled and at the other East passed:

East led the ♠5 and declarer won in hand with the king. There was no time to play on clubs so declarer simply cashed the top diamonds and must have been delighted with East’s contribution. He claimed 10 tricks and +430. Notice it would do declarer no good to take a finesse in diamonds on the second round, since if East held a singleton honor, West would hold four of them.

Declarer made the same ten tricks for +130, but that was 7 imps for Cayne.

On this deal, North-South in the Closed Room had an accident but survived:

In the Open Room, Lauria opened 1NT with the North cards and was soon in 3NT, +690. In the Closed Room:

West needed to lead a spade to defeat this contract, but he tried the ♦5 and now declarer could win and attack trumps. West took the first round and played a second diamond. Declarer won, drew trumps and with fingers crossed set about the clubs. The 3-3 split meant he was +1430 – 12 imps to Mahaffey, who trailed 27-14 at the end of the set.

Mark Horton is a professional player/writer.
Enquiries can be sent to him at Markhorton007@hotmail.com

Welcome Mark

October 1st, 2007  ~  mark horton  ~  1 Comment 

Bridge Blogging would like to welcome Mark Horton, Editor to the World Bridge Federation & the European Bridge League and editor of Bridge Magazine. 

He’s currently editing the bridge bulletin for the World Championships in Shanghai, China and will be bringing you more of the latest news.