[Cascade]

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Trick One ♦A 6 3 (UDCA) 2

Trick Two ♦K 8 T 4

Trick Three ♦ 5 9 Q ♠8

Trick Four ♣ K

Your play?

If you choose to win the ♣ A partner plays ♣5 UDCA

What do you play to the next trick?

Do you consider any other plays?

[mrdct]

Your play? Agree with ♣A.

What do you play to the next trick? ♠3. South looks like a 8221 but has no entry to dummy to pitch a losing ♥ on the ♣Q, so exiting ♠3 looks pretty safe to beat the contract unless declarer is 9121 which seems a bit far fetched. I just want to maximise my chances of going positive on these sorts of hands.

Do you consider any other plays? ♥K was considered as that's obviously the best option for us if partner has the ♥A and might even get the contract for 800 if partner has a natural trump trick. Depending on the mode of scoring, state of the match/session, knowledge of south's preempting style, relative humidity, the moon phase and what I've had for breakfast; I could convince myself to play the ♥K on some days.

[bluejak]

I agree with this post. As to considering other plays, I suppose ducking the club is right if declarer has 8=1=2=2 and partner has ♠Kx. I suppose cashing the ♥K is necessary if declarer is 9=1=2=1. But overall mrdct seems to me to be playing the odds.

[Cascade]

Indeed that defense works. The hand is posted in another thread - Optional Double

I thought this position was more interesting.

If declarer is solid in spades then you need to defend that way whereas as David said if declarer needs a spade finesse then you need to duck.

The real point of the post was to try and get some feel for how likely you are to get a misdefense. On the actual hand this was ducking the ♣K or winning and then playing another club or a heart - a spade or a diamond would defeat the contract.

I thought maybe around 50%. With quite a wide margin for error. Obviously it would depend on the strength of the defender. A bad player perhaps would never duck but may play the wrong card next. A good player maybe more likely to duck but less likely to go wrong if the ace is taken.

[bluejak]

I do not think ducking nor switching to the wrong thing would be SEWoG, if that is the point of the post.

[gnasher]

Cascade, on 2011-April-03, 14:12, said:

Do you consider any other plays?

Now that we've got to this point, I'd like to reconsider my play at trick three (but I'm not suggesting it was a SEWoG).

[Cascade]

bluejak, on 2011-April-05, 06:51, said:

I do not think ducking nor switching to the wrong thing would be SEWoG, if that is the point of the post.

It is not.

The points is to estimate the likelihood of making 4♠ Dbl if the result is adjusted to that contract after partner pulled a slow double to 5♣.

At the table 5♣ was down one and double dummy 4♠ is down one so double dummy there is no damage. However I don't think the defense to 4♠ is trivial so that contract could easily make. We need to assess likely plays in 4♠.

[awm]

I'd play the ♣A; declarer could easily have singleton king. In fact from partner's low club it seems likely declarer did have singleton king.

At this point I would play a spade. It is possible that a heart could be better if declarer has ♥Txx or if declarer has eight spades missing the king and cannot find an entry to finesse. However, it seems hard to be certain partner has the heart ace, and a heart switch if declarer has the ace could obviously be disastrous.

[dburn]

Cascade, on 2011-April-04, 13:56, said:

Indeed that defense works. The hand is posted in another thread - Optional Double

With the club suit having presumably undergone some genetic modification.

[Cascade]

dburn, on 2011-April-05, 14:23, said:

With the club suit having presumably undergone some genetic modification.

Thats over the top of my head.

Is there some mistake in my hand diagram?

[bluejak]

Cascade, on 2011-April-05, 13:26, said:

The points is to estimate the likelihood of making 4♠ Dbl if the result is adjusted to that contract after partner pulled a slow double to 5♣.

At the table 5♣ was down one and double dummy 4♠ is down one so double dummy there is no damage. However I don't think the defense to 4♠ is trivial so that contract could easily make. We need to assess likely plays in 4♠.

Oh, I see. Well the defence will prevail a fair amount of the time so how about 60% making, 40% down one?