[inquiry]

Board 1,
Dlr North,
Vul none

Hand submitted by Jillybean

Bidding shown is by han (north) and jlall (south)

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North was MrGoodwin, south was TimG

The scores for this hand was
6CN = 11
6CS = 7
5NN = 5
4H =3

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After one board, Jlall-han lead 11 to 7.

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Board 2.
Dlr East
Vul N-S

Script: East preempts 3♠ E-W do not bid after that.

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Board 2, North was MrGoodwin and TimG was south.

Both pairs bid to 6NT.

Scores,
7NN = 11
7DN = 10
6NN = 8
6NS = 7
7D/7NS = 6
6DS = 5
3NN = 3

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After two boards, Jlall-han lead 19 to 15

This post has been edited by inquiry: 2010-November-26, 13:03
Reason for edit: correct the club holding in north

[awm]

It's interesting that a less-than-50% slam is getting the top spot on board one. It seems like you cannot make if ♥A is behind the king (unless they lead it) and you also can't make if the clubs are 3-0 offside. Further, you gave a big bonus to 6♣N over 6♣S. Do you think it's that likely east will lead the ♥A if he has it, after an auction that seems to imply heart control on his right? It's not as though the hearts can be discarded.

[PhantomSac]

On board 2 I think north had Kx of clubs (at least at our table!), not KQ

Comments on board 2 with that in mind: Han and I are not a regular partnership (we have played very few times)...we were not on firm ground about both 5S and 6C. Is 5S always coming in diamonds with a first round spade control? (I thought yes). Is 6C a possible place to play, or a cuebid trying for a grand (I thought a cuebid, obviously from my hand!). If 6C was a cuebid I thought Han should certainly bid a grand, but if it could be something like x xx AKQJxx AQJx then 6N is probably right. On that note, what would 5N by me be? Choice of slams, or a grand slam try with no club ace? Regarding his 5S bid I always view 5N as pick a slam, and 5S as coming in my suit with a first round control, though perhaps that is old fashioned/wrong.

I thought it was an interesting hand. Note that even without the CQ, 7 NT the top spot; it is almost always cold on a double squeeze, unless the 3S bidder is 7-4 in the majors without the CQ.

[PhantomSac]

awm, on 2010-November-24, 23:59, said:

It's interesting that a less-than-50% slam is getting the top spot on board one. It seems like you cannot make if ♥A is behind the king (unless they lead it) and you also can't make if the clubs are 3-0 offside. Further, you gave a big bonus to 6♣N over 6♣S. Do you think it's that likely east will lead the ♥A if he has it, after an auction that seems to imply heart control on his right? It's not as though the hearts can be discarded.

It's kind of interesting that 6C is better than 3N if clubs are 3-0 offside if the heart is onside (and a push if it's not). Maybe this is why 6C was awarded higher than 3N?

I think 6C is better than 5C for sure because of the possibility of 3N being played and beating 5C. This seems kind of like a game of rock-paper-scissors (if the whole field is in 6C, play 5C. If the whole field is in 5C, play 3N. If the whole field is in 3N, play 6C (winning over playing 3N for a push >half the time).

[PhantomSac]

It does seem like 3N is the best spot, 6C is not that much better than it and 3N is much better than 5C. EG if it was 1/3rd in 3N, 1/3rd in 5C 1/3rd in 6C, 3N definitely has the highest EV right?

[Fluffy]

I don't understand the rightsiding issues here. Once south has shown 5 hearts playing first board on north is worth nothing.

The other hand there are 13 top tricks, so the rightsiding issues, at least playing in NT, are again worth nothing.

[PhantomSac]

Fluffy, on 2010-November-25, 05:19, said:

I don't understand the rightsiding issues here. Once south has shown 5 hearts playing first board on north is worth nothing.

The other hand there are 13 top tricks, so the rightsiding issues, at least playing in NT, are again worth nothing.

Ben posted the hand wrong, there was no CQ actually, but yeah rightsiding/wrongsiding doesn't seem to matter on the 2nd one. Doesn't really matter since we got to the same contract I guess.

On the first one clubs by north is better than south because if they lead a heart through, you will often go down 2 in 6C from the south on an overruff (eg a stiff heart lead and then a heart ruff with the ten or queen). East might also try leading hearts with 4 to the ace to try to give his partner a ruff.

[Free]

Discussing scores when both pairs bid the same is a waste of time. However, when they don't bid the same it can be useful. For example here, the first deal, the only extra chance is East leading a ♥. If he leads or underleads the ♥A he gave away the contract. If he doesn't have ♥A it doesn't matter. That clearly doesn't justify the 11 imo, I think the difference should be maximum 1 point in this case. If North would've had an 5♦-4♣ then the 11 would be justified.

[PhantomSac]

Free, on 2010-November-25, 06:40, said:

Discussing scores when both pairs bid the same is a waste of time. However, when they don't bid the same it can be useful. For example here, the first deal, the only extra chance is East leading a ♥. If he leads or underleads the ♥A he gave away the contract. If he doesn't have ♥A it doesn't matter. That clearly doesn't justify the 11 imo, I think the difference should be maximum 1 point in this case. If North would've had an 5♦-4♣ then the 11 would be justified.

It is matchpoints so going down 2 is worse than down 1.

BTW about our auction on board 1, I thought it was an interesting hand to bid. I could have bid 2N transfer to clubs and then 4H to show 5-6, but I thought it was pretty likely that 3N would be a good spot if partner had no fit given my 6 very strong clubs and 5 bad hearts, so I opted not to do that.

My 2N showed clubs and 3C showed a fit, now the winning bid might have bid 3D really trying to get to 3N, but I thought that was too much since I am often 1534 for that so partner will have a tough time bidding intelligently imo. I thought of bidding 4S as a splinter, but I thought 4C-4D-4S was a clever way to let my partner know I have no heart control.

Eventually we were slightly too high anyways, I really needed partner to have Ax of hearts; he could have had less of everything else and slam would be very good then.

[TimG]

PhantomSac, on 2010-November-24, 23:59, said:

On board 2 I think north had Kx of clubs (at least at our table!), not KQ

That is my recollection as well; I'm pretty sure we bid the same hands.

[Free]

PhantomSac, on 2010-November-25, 07:16, said:

My 2N showed clubs and 3C showed a fit, now the winning bid might have bid 3D really trying to get to 3N, but I thought that was too much since I am often 1534 for that so partner will have a tough time bidding intelligently imo. I thought of bidding 4S as a splinter, but I thought 4C-4D-4S was a clever way to let my partner know I have no heart control.

hmmm 3♣ showed fit ♣? What do you do without fit for any of the suits, with only a ♥ fit, and with fit for both suits?

[PhantomSac]

Free, on 2010-November-25, 08:51, said:

hmmm 3♣ showed fit ♣? What do you do without fit for any of the suits, with only a ♥ fit, and with fit for both suits?

Without a fit we would bid 3N or 3D or 3S

[inquiry]

Board 1, I guess it is true that there are three kinds of bridge players, those who can count and those who can not. i guess I fall inot the last category. I was thinking south had 4 discards on major suit winners (one on spade and three on diamonds). I think that was the case on the hand originally submitted but I screwed it up somehow when i created it.

This obviously affects the scores. I thought 6♣ from north was close to "laydown" (not 3-0 offside club split) and from south in the 50% in heart lead. Well, that is obviously wrong. So the scores are, well way off.

As for board 2, i mistyped it in here. The club holding was K8 at both tables during the bidding, and that is what it should be. I am use to using lincoverter to create hand for the forum from the lin files used in the bidding contest, but that doesn't work for the new forum. Sorry for that error. I still believe 7NTby north is the winning contract, and my scores were based on the "correct hand" not the one incorrectly posted. From north, a spade can not be lead without costing a trick. This is important for a potential double squeeze. If west leads a spade at trick one, it kills the entry conditions (no spade entry) and you need to unblock hearts, etc to do the squeeze. This feature of which sides plays the contract is why north scores better than south (and with the club queen -- obviously it doesn't matter which side plays the hand).

So the corrected scores are now....

Board 1
5N = 10
6♣ = 5
5♣ = 4
4♥ = 3

Result is that the pairs are now tied after one board, at 5 points each.

Board 2.
As shown in the contest
7NN = 11
7DN = 10
6NN = 8
6NS = 7
7D/7NS = 6
6DS = 5
3NN = 3

After two boards, the "corrected" standings are
Jlall-han = 12
Goodwis = 12

[pretzalz]

inquiry, on 2010-November-26, 13:20, said:

As for board 2, i mistyped it in here. The club holding was K8 at both tables during the bidding, and that is what it should be. I am use to using lincoverter to create hand for the forum from the lin files used in the bidding contest, but that doesn't work for the new forum. Sorry for that error. I still believe 7NTby north is the winning contract, and my scores were based on the "correct hand" not the one incorrectly posted. From north, a spade can not be lead without costing a trick. This is important for a potential double squeeze. If west leads a spade at trick one, it kills the entry conditions (no spade entry) and you need to unblock hearts, etc to do the squeeze. This feature of which sides plays the contract is why north scores better than south (and with the club queen -- obviously it doesn't matter which side plays the hand).

I don't understand. On any lead isn't the desired end position:

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The A♥ squeezes east in spades/clubs and west has presumably already been squeezed in hearts/clubs. This works whenever East has 7 spades and less than 4 hearts. This end position is easily reached on any lead from either side. Or am I completely misunderstanding how the hand is supposed to be played?