Counting the Hand on Defense

While playing defense, it is often useful to try and count the suit distribution of the unseen hands.  You'd be surprised how often you can do this fairly successfully.  For example, take a look at the following hand 8-NT played on BBO last night.

I opted to lead a heart.  Click next to see the play to the first trick, and then make what deductions you can.

Partner should have 7 hearts for her bid.  That gives declarer 4 hearts.  Would declarer bid 3NT without the AH?  Probably not, though possibly.  Let's tentatively give declarer the AH, however.  Would partner preempt without the A, K, Q, or J of hearts?  Probably not.  Let's give her the QH (and keep in mind that the A and Q might be switched-though partner's discouraging signal at trick one probably denies the A).

Let's think about spades.  Dummy has the 5 spades he promised.  Who has the rest?  South almost certainly has at most 2, since he opted for 3NT rather than 4S.  That means partner has 3 or more spades.  Does she have 4?  Maybe, but often people don't preempt when they also hold a 4 card side major.  So the most likely spade distribution is 3 with partner and 2 with declarer.  Who has the QS?  Who knows at this point.  Let's see what else we can gather.

Now to the minors.  Partner has 3 cards (at most).  So declarer has at least 7.  Also, declarer almost surely has stoppers in both minors.  So we can likely place declarer with the KC, with at least one low club.  So partner has 0 or 1 club, and therefore 2 or 3 diamonds.  Declarer has 2 or 3 clubs, and 4 or 5 diamonds.  Declarer probably has the KD as a stopper, though this is perhaps the riskiest inference we've made.  4 or 5 diamonds to the J is a decent stopper.

Now let's count points.  Partner has no HCP in clubs, and probably the QH.  In spades there is the possibility of holding the Q, and in diamonds, there is the possibility of holding the J or K (probably not both).  Declarer has the AH, KC, the K or J of D (or both) and possibly the QS.  He surely has at least 10 HCP to bid.  Of course, partner probably has 4 or 5 to bid as well (maybe fewer with a club void).  That pretty well distributes the points though.  I think the most likely point distribution is declarer with AH, KD, KC, and partner with QH, QS.  Either could have the JD.

Now let's think about the contract.  Things don't seem too good for us.  Declarer has two major A's and 3 clubs via a finesse against the Q.  He won't get more clubs without help from us though.  If declarer doesn't get more spades or hearts, he'll need 4 diamond tricks.  Is there a possible way for declarer to go down?  If so we should play for it.

Where might our tricks come from?  If partner has the QS, we could eventually come to 2 spades.  We already have one heart, and we could conceivable get the diamond Q or the club Q (especially if declarer avoids the finesse fearing partners hearts).  We probably won't get both though.

It seems to me that the only chance we have is to establish partners hearts, and then either find an entry, or use that threat to score some Q's.  So let's lead the JH.  Click next below to advance the play.

What do you think?  Suppose declarer leads back a low diamond, east plays low and south puts up the KD.  Do you play the Q, unblocking for partners possible J?  I think I should.  The other option is to hang on to the QD and put a spade on the table if and when you win the QD.

What would you do?

In the actual play, declarer did lead back a diamond, but East played the JD, as she was forced to do (she had a doubleton).  Clearly we should hang onto the QD.  Furthermore, declarer now has a 4th diamond trick (declarer had 5 diamonds).  Declarer can't go down double dummy.  He has the club finesse.  But he might not take it.  We must play a spade when we win the QD.  Make declarer work.  Sure, if he has the QS, he makes an over trick, but if he doesn't he might screw it up.

Alas, at the table I was not thinking quite so clearly.  I won the QD and fired back a club.  Declarer won the JC and took his 9 tricks.

Double dummy, declarer can't go down.  I never gave him that shot though.  Would he have gotten it right?  Perhaps.  But perhaps not.

The moral of this tale:  Count the hand.  Use the bidding and the play to form possible hands for partner and declarer.  Try to find some plausible hand that allows you to beat the contract.  Failing that, make the play that gives declarer a chance to go down.  It's hard work, and at least at first we'll go wrong except when we're lucky.  But with work, we can all become better defenders.

P.S.  A word about the play.  Zed took a reasonable line.  But perhaps ducking one more round of hearts makes sense.  Once he wins his AH, he no longer has a stopper in hearts.  He is at the mercy of East having an entry, which is certainly plausible given the bidding.  She could be several honors stronger than she is.  What Zed does know, however, is that I have a doubleton heart, and I am winning the second round.  So if he ducks, I can't lead them again to force out his AH.  Now East will need 2 entries to establish the hearts!  It does her no good to overtake my JH either.  Then Zed has 2 stoppers in hearts!  I think holding up has a lot going for it, without much to lose.