YouHold

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

Comments Off

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

Comments Off

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.

Comments Off

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

Comments Off