10th February – Board 4: Game All. Dealer West.
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North was faced with two grim choices on the featured hand, but in truth he couldn’t win whichever road he took. This was the ghastly dilemma he faced:-
West
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North
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East
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South
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3D
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No
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No
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Dbl
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No
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????
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There are several good things about the auction to date, a sound pre-empt – for once – followed by good judgement by East in passing and an equally sound take-out double by South. But what is poor North supposed to do? At one table 4C was the preferred choice but East gave his opinion that that particular contract was not going to be a success, and one can only say that he was right. 1100 to E/W when the smoke had cleared. At another table North elected to pass, which might have been my choice, and hoped for the best, but the best never happened. Or at least it did in a way. I would have thought that once the double had been left in declarer could make an easy eleven tricks because he has been told of the bad trump break. Suppose you get a heart lead. You win in dummy and lead a top club, ruffing out South’s ace. Then surely a trump to the six, pitch a heart on the top club and finesse in spades. Declarer would lose just a trump and a spade. Note that it would do North no good to play the ten of diamonds, as that would suit declarer equally well. So 3D doubled plus two would make, or 1070 to E/W. Not much to choose really!
Yes, of course I am the 4C* victim. Actually I have a lot of difficulty decision-making in hands like this. When a weak hand has opened and his partner has passed, when 4th in hand then doubles I think my partner might have a very strong hand, worth investigating, and that we may get a game ourselves. It rarely occurs to me that it may be better to leave the double in in the expectation of getting declarer down and getting perhaps a better score that way. In this particular case I thought my 3 points and 4 diamonds were likely to be useless in stopping declarer, which is why I bid. I wish I knew more in these situations about whether to bid or not. I suppose in a regular team of 4 you might take into consideration what your partners might do?? Anyway it often seems to be the opposite of what I think and then do turns out to be right - perhaps I'll build that heuristic into my game!!
ReplyDeleteDon't be so hard on yourself because no-one ever really knows what is right in these situations. It's all based on experience I guess. After a weak opening though it could be that the partner of said opener has the good hand - which is the case here - but if you swap the East and South hands round then 3D will go one or two down while 4C will still not make. Preemptive bids are designed to make you lose your mind and temper, and this hand illustrates that point wonderfully. (Or horribly, depending on where you sat at the table.)
ReplyDeleteI tend not to preempt on hands where my points are divided among the suits as it may play better as defense. Responding to a preempt from partner I assume he is over calling by 2 if we are vulnerable (3 if non vulnerable) and bid up in partner's suit on the basis of winners - in this case there are 4 likely winners in East hand, so I would have bid 5 diamonds. Is this still current thinking?
ReplyDeletePeter F
Peter what you say certainly used to be the norm but over the years preempts have been devalued - a bit like everything else! I have my own notions about how to respond to a preempt and it is this: Assume partner has a solid, but one-lose seven card suit, but to make up for such a robust holding give him two small in every other suit - a sterile distribution. So with the East hand in the featured deal I would assume we had two spade losers, and one club loser so I would pass. It's certainly not foolproof but it doesn't give a bad assessment. Of course if you are under about 21 expecting a seven card suit is a bonus.
ReplyDelete