Opponents convention card: Dutch Doubleton
Opponents playing strength: Good
My hand: ♠ T 9 7 6 ♥ Q T ♦ Q J 9 7 4 ♣ T 8
East opens 1 heart and I'm not going to get involved this time around. West jumps to 3 diamonds as a Bergen raise. Partner tries to eat up some bidding room with a 4 diamond bid. East bids 4 spades as a cuebid showing a control in spades for hearts. Well... The opponents are well on their way to slam. And I happen to have QJxxx of a suit partner was willing to bid at the 4 level on his own. I'm definitely bidding here. The question is, what? We have at least 10 diamonds between us, and I'd say 11 is pretty likely. So the opponents have at most 1 diamond loser. I have QT tight of their trump suit, so they're not going to lose anything there. East claims to have spades covered. West has to have 10-12 points over there so he probably has clubs locked up. I'd say they're almost certainly making 6 hearts, which is worth 980 points. Down 4 doubled will only be 800 points, so that's where I want to be. I'd say we're probably taking 8 tricks? Partner's 6 trump and then 2 ruffs in my hand? It's entirely possible partner only has 5 trump, or that we can't find cards to ruff. It's also possible we find extra cards to ruff. At any rate, if we take 8 tricks and want to go down 4 then 6 diamonds is actually the place to be. Do we really only have 5 losers? If partner has a stiff spade, yes. We're probably losing 2 hearts, 2 clubs, and all the spades in partner's hand. Him having a singleton is possible, but I don't think I'm willing to bank everything on it. So I'll make the safe bid of 5 diamonds. West bids 5 hearts, partner bids 6 diamonds, East bids 6 hearts and everyone passes. (In retrospect... Maybe if partner is willing to go to 6 diamonds I should bump it to 7?)
I'm on lead. I can actually imagine a lot of situations where they have 13 tricks if we don't cash our diamond. I could bet everything on partner having a spade void but if that was my plan I should have just bid 7 diamonds. So I lead the Q of diamonds.
| WEST ♠ A J 3 ♥ 9 7 5 4 3 ♦ A ♣ 9 7 6 5 | ||
| SOUTH ♠ T 9 7 6 ♥ Q T ♦ Q J 9 7 4 ♣ T 8 |
| West | North | East | South |
| 1♥ | Pass | ||
| 3♦1 | 4♦ | 4♠2 | 5♦ |
| 5♥ | 6♦ | 6♥ | Pass |
| Pass | Pass | ||
| 1Bergen (invitational, 4+ hearts) | |||
| 2Control in spades for hearts | |||
Q-A-8-3 of clubs. Whoa. Partner has SEVEN! And not the ace. We were getting murdered in 6 diamonds doubled! Declarer then draws trump. 3-3 of diamonds-A-T. Ok. Partner has a void, and it's in hearts. So maybe we weren't so murdered after all. 2 club losers, a diamond, and as many spades as partner has. Ok, that's still only down 4 when he has a singleton. And a 1-0-7-5 distribution feels pretty unlikely.
The play from that point is pretty straightforward. I have no decisions at all to make. But it turns out partner scores both the A and Q of clubs! So they're actual down 1! Huzzah! Even better, there are lines of play that actually let them make the contract (finesse with the J of clubs) so this may be a good score.
| NORTH ♠ Q 8 5 ♥ ♦ K T 8 6 5 3 2 ♣ A Q 4 | ||
| WEST ♠ A J 3 ♥ 9 7 5 4 3 ♦ A ♣ 9 7 6 5 | EAST ♠ K 4 2 ♥ A K J 8 6 2 ♦ ♣ K J 3 2 | |
| SOUTH ♠ T 9 7 6 ♥ Q T ♦ Q J 9 7 4 ♣ T 8 |
Jack disagrees with my diamond bid, because 'Jack expects a disaster after 5 diamonds.' I think Jack needs to read up on the Law of Total Tricks! He then disagrees with my opening lead because he doesn't understand Rusinow leads. He wants me to lead the J from QJ. Which would be right in a normal suit, but when leading partner's bid suit that convention is off. (Because of the number of times you want to lead the suit from Qxx or Jx or whatever.)
Ranking after board 46/60: 10/16 with 48.14%
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