Summer Festival of Bridge Blog 7

Posted 19 January 2010 by Ron

Try this problem:

East dealer : North-South vulnerable

West	North	East	South
- - -	- - -	Pass	1
Pass	2 (1)	Pass	2 (2)
Pass	3	Pass	?

(1) Forcing to game
(2) Does not promise extra strength

What would you do now as South with:

(Solution later)

We are a team-of-four for the South-West Pacific Teams, which promises to be a grueling five-day event to qualify for the finals, known as the National Open Teams. My partner is Matt Mullamphy and Bill Jacobs – Ben Thompson from Melbourne are at the other table.

Our results yesterday were ordinary with a 20-10 win, 7-23 loss and 23-7 win for 50 VPs on the day. We are lying 62nd. More results on the www.abf.com.au website.

Back to today’s problem:
This was Board 18 from Round 3:

North
8 5 4
- - -
A K J 10 7 6 5
A 5 4

West
Q 7 2
J 8 4
3
K J 10 9 7 3

East
10 6 3
A Q 10 9 2
Q 8 2
8 6

South
A K J 9
K 7 6 5 3
9 4
Q 2

Matt Mullamphy did really well to bid 3NT over 3. That protected the Q from the opening club lead. West led the J and South won with the Q. He ended with ten tricks.
3NT can always be defeated via a heart lead, but that is highly unlikely. At the other table North was in 3NT on the 8 lead, queen, king, ducked. North won the next cluband continued with A, K. The result was four down for –400.

Note that 5 fails, though that is an unlucky result.