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One chance out of one or one chance out of two?

One chance out of one would seem to be a 50% chance of success while one chance out of two seems to have a 75% chance of success. So, it would seem obvious to go for the 75% line….but there are complications!

 

You open a slightly off-shape 12-14 1NT and are very soon in game. West leads the 2 to East’s Q. At trick 2, East switches to the 6. Plan how you are going to make 9 tricks. Indeed, if you make 9 tricks, you are likely to make 10! East-West lead 3rds and 5ths.

Either way, the play so far has not been very helpful. If you were to think about such matters (only at the end of the deal!), you might wish you had opened 1 which might have resulted in your partner playing the same contract on a rather different lead. Telling them nothing about your shape does not seem to have worked!

From the opening lead and then the switch, it seems almost certain that the spade break is 5-1. The other fact, pretty obvious really, is that you would like to play the diamond suit without loss.

Two-way finesses are everyone’s nightmare. Here, there are conflicting reasons to finesse both ways.

Vacant spaces suggests that East is more likely to hold diamond length making the trick 3 play of a diamond to the jack attractive. However, if that finesse fails, you are down and out as the defence will take 3 spade tricks, K and Q. No chance of recovery. Also, you cannot handle a situation where East holds Qxxx since you have only one entry to dummy and will never establish the suit before the defence assembles 5 tricks. Imagine, also, if West held singleton Q. You would want to throw the “vacant spaces” principle into the rubbish bin!

There is a counter-argument, too. By playing a diamond to the ace and then running the J, you will be very happy when Q is doubleton (or singleton!) with West but you still have a second chance of survival even if the finesse loses. East would return a club (as we know they have no more spades) and you will survive by putting up Q playing East for the K. Is either of those two chances too much to ask for?

 

(hand rotated)

Take “vacant spaces” out of the rubbish bin! It lives to tell the tale. The 50% line worked (well, you can claim a little more than 50% because of the better chance of East holding more diamonds) while the 75% line failed. Indeed, South ended down 2.

In the quarter final of last weekend’s Mixed Trial, at 7 out of 8 tables a spade was led. Three declarers made their contract while four failed. 

Richard Solomon

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