YouHold

A friend of mine was declaring 4♠ on an uneventful auction. He received the ♠J opening lead.

Declarer cashed a second spade (both opponents following, West with the ♠T), played 3 rounds of diamonds pitching a club (all follow, no ♦J). He then led a low club from the table, East playing the ♣J as he ruffed. He then exited a trump to East, to this ending:

A complex ending to be sure. If East gets out the JD, declarer is more or less compelled to play for a club/heart squeeze against West. If East doesn’t get out a diamond, then declarer has a number of options, ranging from playing East to be endplayed to a simple diamond/heart squeeze against West to many more complicated squeezes against either or both opponents. This can also lead to some interesting deceptive options for the defence.

Consider this East hand:

If you exit the ♦J when you are on lead with the ♠Q, declarer has no real choices other than the (winning) heart/club squeeze. If, however, you exit with a low club, declarer may go wrong in a number of ways. (Discarding, playing for the wrong squeeze, etc.)

No guarantees that declarer will go wrong, of course, but it always pays to consider alternative defences, even when an ‘obvious’ play is available.

Post Mortem: East did not hold the diamond at the table, and my friend got the ending right to make the rest of the tricks.

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I thought I’d have a lot of time to start working on posts as my previous job winds down, but the opposite has been true.  Tying up loose ends has taken up quite a bit of my time.  However, all things come to an end, and the time is near.
Look for a wrap up of the events from Hawaii, a few interesting hands from play both from myself and others, plus more coming soon.

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I have a had a post on my mind for a while now that due to confidentiality, I couldn’t write about. It has been very difficult to write about anything else, when there’s only one bridge topic on my mind.
Last month, I have made the decision to try to pursue bridge full time. I am leaving my corporate job and will make bridge my life. It is a very exciting transition, one which took a lot of soul searching to make. I feel that it is the right decision for me at this point in my …read more

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Yesterday I posted the following card combination, asking how you would play given different goals.

♠ AQ74

♠ J865

How do you play this combination…
1a) …for 4 tricks?
You have very few options here other than finding the K doubleton of spades onside. Lead low to the Q, cash the Ace and hope the K drops. Because you do not have either the 10 or 9 of spades, you cannot afford to lead the J from your hand. West covering would guarantee a loser in the suit.
1b) …for 3 tricks?
Play the Ace of the suit first. If the …read more

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Card combination problems are a good way to work on improving your technical declarer play. By focusing on a single suit, you can simplify the play for a complex hand. This can give easily turn into positive results at the table.
For each of these problems, unless otherwise stated, assume that you are playing in notrumps with plenty of communications in side suits to lead the key
suit in any manner you wish. (Examples, leading up to dummy twice, etc.)
The object in each of the questions below is to play in a manner which gives you the greatest chance …read more

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I’m still playing around with formats for the site, what looks best. One of my biggest problems is with hand diagrams. Up to now, I’ve been using images mixed with text, formatted using tables. It’s been okay, but not everything I’d like it to be.
Sample:

AQTxxx
—
—
AKT9xxx

It works, but it doesn’t always look clean.
Another idea is to use HTML elements and fonts to express suit symbols:

♠ AQTxxx
♥ —
♦ —
♣ AKT9xxx

I’m still not convinced which I like better.

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I just got back from a vacation in Las Vegas. As a card player, it’s natural enough that I played a little poker while I was there. Bridge is a more satisfying game to me, but I still enjoy the occasional poker game as well.
It was very distressing to me to come back to hear about the new internet gambling bill which got tied to a port security bill. I can understand why the government might want to become involved in taxing the lucrative online poker industry, but banning it all together is simply misguided protectionism.
Most casino …read more

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I’ll be away on vacation for the next week.  I’ll be back for regularly scheduled blogging when I get back (October 1st).

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The USA, down -1 to 1 “Buffet Point” going into the finaly day of play, pulled out on top to win the first ever Buffet Cup.
More details at http://buffetcup.com/.

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This year, there is a new event on the international bridge cicuit, the inaugural Warren Buffet Bridge Cup. This bridge event was conceived and created by Warren Buffett, the “Oracle of Omaha”.
This tournament is modeled after the Ryder Cup, a golf tournament where the best from the US take on the best from Europe. 12 of the best players are competing for each time.
You can find out more at http://buffetcup.com/

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