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TALES OF AKARANA

CREATING YOUR OWN FUN

On a night where so many of the deals seemed to be routine games (even 6-6 in the majors is fairly common-place these days!), one player decided to create his own piece of excitement.

I am not sure what your thoughts would be when your partner opens a first in hand not vulnerable against vulnerable 3Diamond-smallpre-empt and you (West) hear a take-out double on your right. You hold:

Spade-small A98754

Heart-small J4

Diamond-small 5

Club-smallAQJ7

I can tell you what mine were as my partner opened 3Diamond-small too. I was delighted that the opposition were going to play this board, probably in hearts…that is, as long as my left-hand opponent did not make a penalty pass. I passed in my sleep and when I awoke, I found that partner had already made the opening lead. More of that later.

Feitong Chen decided to “walk into the valley of death”. He called 3Heart-small! I cannot find much upside to this bid which could/ should result in tears, maybe big minus ones.

Psyche.png

North passed without any apparent discomfort and Feitong’s partner, Clair Miao, did what she just had to do, raise to 4Heart-small even though she was highly suspicious of that 3Heart-small bid. That got passed round to North who seemed to be aware that there were an awful lot of hearts around the table. “Double” and the wisdom of the 3Heart-small call became very much in doubt.

After calling his shorter major, it would seem that Feitong would at least mention his 6 card one. No. He retreated to what at best would be a 7-1 5 level fit. North pulled out his second double card.

I have seen some first-in-hand favourable vulnerability pre-empts look somewhat less than satisfactory, maybe even worse, and were I Feitong, I would be severely worried how many light this contract would go. Clair received the Spade-smallQ lead….and made an overtrick!

Board 2
East Deals
N-S Vul
K 6
K 10 9 5
9 7 3
10 6 5 2
A 9 8 7 5 4
J 4
5
A Q J 7
 
N
W   E
S
 
10
8 7 2
A K Q 8 6 2
9 4 3
 
Q J 3 2
A Q 6 3
J 10 4
K 8
West North East South
Feitong   Clair  
    3  Dbl
3  Pass 4  Pass
Pass Dbl Pass Pass
5  Dbl All pass  

 

It became a simple matter of winning the opening lead, ruffing a spade, drawing trumps (3-3 break was handy), taking the club finesse (even handier!), ruffing another spade, another club finesse (it worked this time too!), a third spade ruff, another club to dummy and enjoyment of two high spades for heart discards. Indeed, it was lucky for the defence that clubs were 4-2 or else Clair would have made the lot.

Did Feitong really ask his partner why she did not bid to 6Diamond-small after his “constructive” auction or was he still in a state of shock at the outcome?

Boringly, I got to defend 3Heart-small which went a quiet 3 down for a pretty handy 300 score though not nearly as handy as Clair’s 650. My condolences to North-South. Most days, they will return with a reasonable plus score.  We can all see this odd auction required a heart lead. Well, it did not. It seems only a club lead (or heart lead, club switch) will beat 5Diamond-small, taking a valuable entry to dummy from declarer before spades have been played.

Clair says she enjoys playing with Feitong. Maybe you can see why!

Richard Solomon

 

 

 

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