Round 4.
Board 5. NS vul, Dealer N.
QT9
KJ764
8
9862
AK72 63
52 T9
AKJ62 QT754
T3 AKQ5
J854
AQ83
93
J74
N E S W
P 1D P 1S
P 2C P 2H(1)
x P P 3D
P 3H x 3S
P P P
(1) 4th suit forcing (GF)
As you can see, 3S is a rather stupid contract. And there's a saying that
whoever passed a forcing bid should be responsible for the bad results. In
this case that would be me.
What I didn't figure out was that Fred was still trying for slam after 3Hx, by
cuebidding S, that seemed to be wrong. The key issue is which round of H
control do we have. Since I passed the 1st double, I've denied 1st round
control. Therefore what Fred should do is to pass the 2nd double and see if I
can redouble that to show the 2nd round control. When I failed to do so, he
can bid 5D himself comfortably without torturing pd. From my perspective, his
bid suggested something like 5-2-3-3 or 5-2-4-2 shape with only invitational
value, something like AQJxx xx AJx xxx, and after my 2C rebid, he got endbid.
Since game is a long shot with that hand, I broke the discipline and guessed
to pass.
Against Fred's 3S, North played 3 rounds of H. Fred ruffed in dummy and
piteched a D from his hand. He next ducked a trump, and defense persisted with
another H, Fred ruffed and played trump AK and started to run the D suit.
South still had the master and last trump to ruff but he had no H to cash.
Nice play and +140 but a poor 8/51.
This hand also illustrated another principle: don't double oppo's artificial
bids for lead directing, especially 4th suit forcing. In most cases, that
would be the natural lead anyway. Doubling runs the risk of being redoubled,
offering more bidding space, clarifying honor position, clarifying control,
etc, etc.
Board 6. EW vul. Dealer E
Q4
A53
A975
8543
AK962 JT75
QJ62 984
QT6 3
A KJT62
83
KT7
KJ842
Q97
We bid to the S game after Fred opened 1S and I responded a Bergen 3C. The
defense cashed the 1st 3 tricks and left Fred to guess the trump Q. Fred
correctly dropped it for +620 and a nice 37/51.