Summer Festival of Bridge Blog 11

Posted 02 February 2010 by Ron

Try this problem:

The opponents bid 1NT (15-17) : 3NT. What do you lead from:

Final Roundup of the Summer Festival of Bridge
The major event at the Summer Festival of Bridge is the National Open Teams, preceded by the 14-round qualifying South-West Pacific Teams. The SWPT was won by MILNE (Liam Milne – Michael Whibley, Adam Edggton – Andy Hung, Nabil Edggton – Alex Smirnov) with 268 Victory Points ahead of STERN (David Stern – Robert Grynberg, Tania Lloyd – Stephen Burgess, Phil Gue – Paul Wyer) on 263 and DE LIVERA (Arjuna De Livera – Ian Robinson, Richard Brightling – Ian Thomson,  Matthew McManus – Michael Ware), also on 263.

In the first stage of the NOT finals, MILNE defeated BLOOM (Martin Bloom, Peter Gill, Paul Gosney, Sartaj Hans – Tony Nunn) narrowly, 83-81, and DE LIVERA 53-42. That took MILNE direct to the semi-finals, where they chose BILAL (Gulzar Bilal, Sarfraz Khan, Seamus Browne, Khokan Bagchi, Michael Smart) as their opponents and won by 145-77. In the meantime, DE LIVERA had used their second chance to reach the semi-finals, where they met LILLEY (David Lilley – Zoli Nagy, Andrew Braithwaite – Bill Haughie, Nye Griffiths – Justin Williams) and defeated them by 142-116 after a close early tussle. In the final DE LIVERA beat MILNE by 141-101.
 
Board 2 of the NOT semi-finals:

South dealer : East-West vulnerable

At one table:

WestNorthEastSouth
- - - - - - - - - 1club
1spade 2diamond 2spade Dble
Pass 3spade (1) Pass 3NT
Pass Pass Pass  

(1) Stopper ask

Lead: A
East played the J and West continued with a low spade to the 10 and queen. When the diamond finesse failed, declarer lost five spades, a diamond and a club for three down, – 150.

At another table:

WestNorthEastSouth
- - - - - - - - - 1NT
Pass 3NT All Pass  

West led the K. East played the J on the K lead and West shifted to a club. East took the A and returned the 10, queen, ducked. Declarer now had nine tricks and when East let a heart go, it was ten tricks for +430 and +11 Imps.

As declarer in no-trumps, it is normal to duck a round with A-K-x-x-x-x in dummy with no entries. The same can be applied in defence. Assuming declarer has a spade stopper, such as Q-J-x, if West starts with a low spade lead here, declarer has no chance. This caters for partner having two spades with the spades 2-2-3 around the table. A first and then a low spade works only when partner has three spades.

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