A Fun Sunday Afternoon

Isabelle and I have changed our start time on Sundays to about 2PM. We were lucky enough to have David and Jeff as opponents today and David was even on time. If you think that playing against them isn’t fun look what happened on the very first hand. Isabelle opens the bidding with 1C and David overcalls 2S with none vulnerable. Your hand is surprisingly strong 22HCP:

S K7 H QJ D AKQJ52 C AJ2

You bid 3D expecting a pass on your left. But the bidding in this strange deal continues 3H by Jeff and 4D by Isabelle. David passes and you can’t believe that Isabelle doesn’t have a heart card so you Blackwood and arrive in 6D which is of course cold. Isabelle has her bids sort of:

S Q H A108 D1087 CKQ10987

I leave you to guess at the two opposing hands and no Jeff did not have his bid.

The whole table has been working on me to improve my two level overcalls (which are rather notorious) especially vulnerable. I was in fourth chair when David opened 1S and I held S K108 H A D AKJ82 C Q1095. I thought this one was good enough even though I didn’t have the "usual" sixth diamond. We ended up in 3D which was a fine spot.  Will see how all this discipline works out over time.

Board 10 was a really neat play hand.

	S AJ1082
	H 7
	D AQ83
Linda	C 1072	Isabelle
S 9754		S K63
H KJ43		H AQ8
D 1092		D K764
C 93	David	C A85
	S Q
	H 109652
	D J5
	C  KQJ64

 

Jeff	Isabelle	David	Linda
		Pass	Pass
1S	1NT	2C*	Pass
2H	Pass	3C	All Pass

* either diamonds or hearts and a minor

I led the C3 and Isabelle won the CA and returned the C5. Do you think you have reached the critical moment on the hand? You have. You have to win the club in hand with an honour, leaving your C10 as a late entry. David made the tiny error of ducking the club to dummy’s C10.

Lets say you win the club in hand and you run the SQ (ducked). You can then run the DJ (say it is won be the defence). Now you still have two entries to dummy and the defence can’t prevent you from setting up more spades tricks or ruffing a heart. It doesn’t matter whether you play diamonds or spades first you can’t make it without winning the first club in hand. Try it. I do say that Isabelle did defend rather splendidly when she ducked the DJ when David finessed it.

Board 13 was one of those high level decisions we all look forward to. You are all vulnerable and your hand is S AQJ832 H2 D Q104 C A72

Jeff	Isabelle	David	Linda
	Pass	2H*	2S
4H	4S	Pass	Pass
5H	All Pass

Do you bid 5S, pass or double? 2H shows 11-14 with six hearts.

If you bid 5S you are a winner. Partner has S K1074 H 1075 D 6 C QJ1083. Maybe I should have let the sixth spade push me over but isn’t this just the kind of hand I am supposed to have to make a vulnerable two level overcall? What do you think? 5S is down 1 and 5H makes.

Can you think of something better to do on Sunday afternoon?