Lockdown League Season 3 report

Three of  the four Woodberry teams (A,B and C) played in Division 6 this season.

Woodberry A (Andy Conway's team) finished 15th and are relegated to Division 7
Woodberry B (Paul Lamford's team) finished 4th and are promoted to Division 5
Woodberry C (Dominic Flint's team) finished 11th and remain in Division 6

Woodberry D (Steve Coulter's team) played in Division 9. They finished 8th and remain in that Division.

Hot Defence by Nigel Stuttard

The board was played in the Woodberry online game on Tuesday 16th June.

Beware of exes. Iain and Jim, both erstwhile partners of mine, came up with an impressive defence on this deal.

King of diamonds lead, ducked. Club switch, ducked to North’s king, followed by a diamond to the 7. Iain then switched to 9 of hearts. 

This is my moment. All I need to do is win with the ace, cash exactly two rounds of clubs and the ace of diamonds, throw Jim in with a heart and he is endplayed. 

Unfortunately I didn’t have the double dummy facility available at the time, so I cashed  three rounds of clubs, both defenders throwing diamonds and then a round of spades - 4, 8 ,Q, K.

After winning two rounds of hearts, North exited with the jack of spades and took the final setting trick with the 9 of spades.

Why don’t they play like that when they partner me? Perhaps they do and I’m too dumb to notice.

Short Shrift

We are taught when we first learn bridge that we need about 32-33 points to make a slam. As we play more this estimate is lowered, with controls and shortage playing a bigger part. The above slam was only reached by four pairs at the Woodberry Weekly competition, but the chances of success, just looking at the NS hands alone, is around 77% (according to my bot) so you definitely want to be there. If trumps are 3-2 you have 11 top tricks with many chances for a twelfth, such as the ace of spades onside, clubs 4-3 or various squeezes. And you might be able to cope with trumps 4-1 as long as there is a singleton jack or ten.

The opening bid on the North hand is the first choice. Playing four-card majors and a weak NT you should open 1D, as you can rebid 2NT if partner bids 2C.  Playing strong and five, you have to open 1D and then rebid 3NT if partner bids 2C, assuming 2NT shows a weak NT. I am sure that Zia would open 1NT as he usually does on this sort of hand, but 1D is normal. South has a choice between 1H and 2C. The former is my choice; it keeps the bidding lower and whatever partner bids we will be able to describe our hand well. On this occasion, North will bid 3H, showing about a 6-loser hand, assuming that one does not have elaborate methods here. In spades one has 1.5 losers, in hearts 2.5 losers, and in the minors one loser each. South also has about 6 losers, although the club suit is more than one loser, so should be thinking of slam.

One method here is to use the next suit up, which also works after 1H-3H or 1S-3S, as an enquiry. It is variously called a short-suit slam try, which is too much of a tongue-twister, or a WET, which is a wastage enquiry try. North responds with the lowest suit in which a shortage would interest him. If, in this example, North bids 3NT that would say, "I would accept a slam try opposite short spades, I have no wastage there". Similarly for 4C or 4D, but they "refuse" the suit bypassed. If you would accept all slam tries, then you just bid it or RKCB if that is preferred. The beauty of the method, is that you don't have to have a shortage at all to make the bid, and it can be used as a general slam-try. Of course, partners never remember the methods, and North's 4C was just intended as a cue-bid. I bid slam anyway as I was accepting unless partner signed off in 4H, and the good slam was reached, but our auction was far from convincing.  Of course if you are in slam you have to make it, and when one declarer was North on the lead of the queen of diamonds (obviously top of a sequence), he drew two rounds of trumps and played a spade towards the KQ. West hopped up and gave his partner a diamond ruff for all the matchpoints. North should start trumps with the ace and then the queen, and can draw the third round before playing a spade.

Doug opened the North hand 1NT, Zia-style, and Chantal bid Stayman. Now North bid 2H and South should have employed another 3S "toy". Here 3S is either a splinter for hearts or a hand too good to raise to 4H. North puppets with 3NT and South bids 4H with the splinter, or cues with a hand too good to raise to 4H. Here that would be 4C, and the North hand is now very big, and he can bid 6H.

Toing and Froing

The above phrase is one of the most frequently searched in the Macmillan Online Dictionary and non-native speakers wonder why neither word is pronounced in the same way as the most frequent word used by Zebidee of Magic Roundabout fame, which was "Boing".

There were chances aplenty for both sides on the above complex hand from this week's Woodberry Online Pairs, but the defence had the last word, as happened at most tables. The declarers who made the contract had considerable help. One was when Gerry Weston led a small diamond (on a different auction) and that gave declarer his ninth trick. Ken Barnett benefited from East going in with the ace of clubs on the first round, while Anne Catchpole made the contract after a misdefence by East who had a setting diamond to cash.

In theory, the only defence is an initial club lead, which is never going to happen. When Doug Dunn was declarer, West led a normal five of spades and declarer won with the seven and led a club to the king. Now, in theory, declarer has to play a second spade, to the jack, which squeezes East in three suits. If he discards a heart, declarer has time to develop two tricks in hearts. If he discards a diamond, declarer makes three diamond tricks and if he discards a club then declarer has four clubs tricks. However Doug continued with a second club, ducked by David Burn, East and a third club which in theory David has to duck again. However, he won and now Doug discarded a small heart but as we will see he needs that and has to throw a spade. East now switched to the nine of diamonds, and Doug thought he could make it by winning and playing a heart, but East can win and play a second diamond, and now if declarer finesses the jack of spades, East has to pitch a small heart. And if Doug cashes the ace of spades, only then can East pitch a diamond. The defcnce always prevails. 

The beautiful winning line was for South to throw a spade on the ace of clubs while West discards a small diamond. Now East still plays the nine of diamonds which South has to win, but now he leads a heart, and if West plays low has to put in the eight. Now East plays another diamond and South wins, West unblocking the queen. while dummy parts with a heart. Now declarer must lead the queen of spades, not low to the jack. East can discard a small heart but then a spade to the ace squeezes him out of a red winner. South needs all three small hearts in a strange way as otherwise West can discard a heart and keep four diamonds. 

Greed and Generosity
A quiz in a North London pub asked competitors to name the Seven Deadly Sins and their corresponding Virtues. I was more familiar with the former, but the rest of the team helped with the latter and we scored well. Greed and generosity are a pair, and they were present on this board.

Amazingly, on the most interesting board, the room was flat in 6NT=, and Dr Frances Loughridge and  David Burn had a good auction to the top spot, East bid out his shape with 3D, showing in principle a 4-1-3-5 hand, and Frances bid 5NT asking David to pick a slam. Mindful of the matchpoint scoring, he chose no-trumps.

5NT was a little precipitous in that ♠Axxx ♥x ♦Kxx ♣AQxxx is rather a good grand but I am sure David would have chanced 6H with that, suggesting grand slams in three denominations, but still happy to play in 6NT. Playing Minorwood, West can raise 3D to 4D. Partner will show two without, by bidding 4NT, and now West knows that 7 is at best on a finesse.

The generous souls were the East-West pair who punted the poor 7D, and an equally generous North who led a heart against 6NT, allowing declarer to make 13 tricks without the diamond finesse.  They both shall remain nameless and unsurprisingly they did not trouble the scorers as they say in cricket.

Of course, they needed to be matched by a greedy player, and Ken Rolph, North, was not prepared to take his average, and discouraged diamonds and then bared his king on the run of the clubs. He was disappointed that declarer did not ask what discards they were playing, and even more disappointed when declarer, Peter Nash, eschewed the diamond finesse and dropped his king at trick twelve! The other greedy player was the East who went for the higher-scoring 4-2 spade fit, and picked 6S, and although this was cold, it wouldn't have scored any matchpoints, so his failure to make it was not relevant.

The Hidden Hand

One of the beauties of bridge is that you can only see 26 of the 52 cards, unless you are someone like the player banned for ten years for "substituting his own cards for the ones provided by the organisers." I will leave you to look him up in Wikipedia under "Cheating at Bridge". The hidden hand was the theme of this interesting board from last night's Woodberry Pairs:

Playing 5-card majors, the auction will begin 1D-1S-2NT, and now it is important to know what bids mean. Stefanie and I realised here we had not discussed it properly, and have now adopted what is known as a Wolff sign-off after a jump rebid to 2NT. North would bid 3C, forcing 3D, when he wants to sign off at the three level in either his suit or his partner's suit, and everything else is game-forcing. This allows North to bid 3D, forcing, on the above hand, a slam try. Probably South should decline, but slam is about 50%, perhaps a litte more, so it is reasonable to bid as Stefanie did.

I certainly did not make the most of my chances here, although I would probably have gone down anyway. West led a passive trump, which is quite dangerous as her partner might have had the queen, and I won in dummy and woodenly took a spade finesse, for one off. The right line is to lead a club towards the king. In theory, East has to duck this, as otherwise the jack of clubs comes down in three rounds, but he can also, in practice, rise with the ace of clubs and play a spade. He has seen the ten of clubs from South, so he knows the jack of clubs is coming down in three rounds or South has it, so a spade is called for. I don't know the jack of clubs is falling however, so I will finesse anyway and go down; especially as if I rise I also need trumps 2-2. But I did not give him a chance to win the club and exit with a diamond for example, so my line of play was wrong.

When South opened 1H, the auction invariably reached 3NT, on a club or spade led with declarer making 10 or 11 tricks, for well above average. John Bernard, arseblog, opened 2H as East, which was Lucas. I am all in favour of that with the heart intermediates somewhat better than the Spurs midfield. South soon reached 3NT and West led a heart to the king which South ducked. Winning, crossing to a diamond and taking the spade finesse is an alternative line. That will only make nine tricks however, as West can win, put his partner in with a club, and the ten of hearts comes through giving four defensive tricks. After the king of hearts was ducked, East continued with the ten of hearts, and South foolishly ducked that as well. Now a third heart beat the contract. Covering with the jack would at least have made it. However, the defence can do better still. If East wins the king of hearts and returns a low heart (a no-cost play), declarer might well put in the jack, fatally as the cards lie. Don't forget South cannot see East's hand, and this is the way East should defend with Kx KQ9xx xx Jxxx. South now gets a juicy +660 if the jack holds, but as the cards lie he gets egg on his face.

Lapsus calami(tous)

Misclicks are the bugbear of online bridge, and are normally undone in the auction, but here Ken Barnett thought he was stuck with his choice of 1S on the North hand despite the fact it was a friendly teams match.

Ken was North, and the auction was surreal, ending in 6NT when Bill Linton, South, twice believed that his partner really had spades, and cham16 was champing at the bit hoping to defend 6S. She led the KS and Ken won, cashed six rounds of clubs,  finessed the queen of hearts, and threw Liz Clery (whoooosh) in with the third round of diamonds and made his contract. However, the defence could have prevailed with West baring the king of hearts to keep a spade so that the endplay was not possible.

However, there was no defence to a remarkable line of play which is possible if Ken ducks the king of spades. The defence exit with a club, and you win in South, finesse the queen of hearts, and cash all the clubs reaching this ending, rotated for convenience:

Now you lead the last club from South. West has to keep Qx in both spades and diamonds, so has to bare the jack of hearts, you throw the jack of spades, cash the ace of hearts, and cross to the king of diamonds and cash the ace of spades to squeeze East in hearts and diamonds. A compound guard squeeze, a rara avis indeed.