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Surprising percentages

 

ª 6

© Q J 10 8

¨ A J 10 8 4 3

§ J 9

ª K 8 4                      ª 9 3

© K 6 3                      © 9 7 5 4 2

¨ Q 7 6 2                   ¨ K 9 5

§ 7 4 2                        § Q 5 3

ª A Q J 10 7 5 2

© A

¨ -

§ A K 10 8 6

This deal occurred in a local duplicate.  It is difficult for South to avoid bidding a slam even when he finds out that North has no support in either suit.  Of the eleven pairs five bid 6ª (one tried 6NT and was lucky to go only one off); the remaining five bid 4ª (nobody tried 5ª).  All the pairs in 4ª made 12 tricks but only two pairs who bid the slam made it.  The double dummy lead to beat the slam is a low spade.

 

At least one declarer won the heart lead, played a low club to force an entry to dummy and then took the losing spade finesse.  That only succeeds when East has precisely ªK or ªK x.  Let’s call that Plan A.

 

The line I favoured, Plan B, was to play §A K and, if §Q had not appeared, ruff in dummy.  That succeeds on all 3-3 club breaks and any club break where §Q drops singleton or doubleton as long as the short club hand does NOT hold precisely three small spades (in which case his partner will win the second spade and give him a ruff).

 

 

Without such strong clubs in hand Plan B would need clubs 3-3.

 

The calculations I made at the table for Plan A were: clubs 3-3 32%; plus § Q doubleton about 14% of which most will succeed.  The actual percentage for plan B is surprisingly high – 49.3% assuming perfect defence.  Plan A is only 13.9% which is also surprising since ªK and ªK x in East are 16.4% until you realise that there will be an obvious ruff in some of these cases.

 

I was a little embarrassed by bidding a poor slam but “at the table” it was a 50-50 bet (only Garozzo and a few others find the spade lead and even that does not always kill it).