Slam Entries

After a quick auction, you find yourself in 6NT. South bid 2♦ showing at least 5-4 (in some order) in diamonds and a higher suit.  Click next to see the opening lead and make your plan for the play of the hand.

 

Wouldn't we give a lot for one of us to have the 2♦ in one of our hands rather than a low heart.  Of course, we are fortunate to not get a heart lead and make us guess right off the bat.

What is our situation?  We are sure of 6 club tricks, 2 diamond tricks and 3 spade tricks.  There is no chance of extra club or diamond tricks.  There is an outside chance of a 4th spade trick (if the JT drop).  And finally, we could hope that South has either the A or Q of hearts, and that we  guess correctly which he has.

Let's think about what South has.  Though his bid technically shows 5-4 in some order, zeddible was slightly confused about the system, so we know he had 5+♦ and 4+ of some major.  Also, we are missing only 8 high card points.  Would zeddible really have bid over 1NT without most (if not all) of them?

I think our chances are good.  Unless zeddible has really strong distribution, he almost certainly has the A♥. Can we check on the distribution by running clubs?

We have to be careful.  We don't have a lot of transportation.  Suppose we run clubs first (overtaking with the A on the third round to keep running clubs.  Then we need to use spades to enter our hand for the heart finesse.  But in spades, we need to take the Q first, or we block the suit.  Then we have to cash the AK of spades, since we have no entries left.  And then we can take the heart finesse, but we go down if whoever has the A of hearts also has a 4th spade.

For a similar reason, we can't take the AKQ of spades to see if the JT drop before we try the heart finesse.  We have to choose.  The right choice is clearly the finesse.  Given the bidding, south should have the A♥.

So we need to deal with entries.  We can't use spades as the entry for the heart finesse.  We don't anticipate changing our mind with and distribution discoveries, now that we've thought about the hand.  We can afford to take the KQJ of clubs first, but then we must lead a heart toward the K.  If south plays the A, we have 12 tricks.  If not...put up that K.  With only 4 points, is south going to bid?  Unlikely.  Play the K and hope for the best.  If it holds, cash the diamond, the rest of the clubs, and the spades and see if you make 6 or 7.  If it loses, and they don't lead back a heart, hope the spade split is very favorable (run the clubs first-maybe they'll discard an important spade.  Or maybe they'll even be squeezed-hang on to your 4th spade and one more heart as long as possible, and count).

Just don't do what I did: start playing, and then think.  I planned to run clubs, and find out some distribution information.  By the time I realized I was short entries, it was too late.  I did my best to salvage the situation. I cashed three spades, hoping that either the JT would drop, or that south had the A♥ and at most three spades (so they couldn't cash the setting trick).

I got lucky.  The JT of spades dropped AND the A♥ was onside with only 3 spades.  So it would have been hard to go down.  I tried though.

The moral.  Think early.  Think about your plan.  Think about entries.