Defensive Errors #1 - Unsupported Aces Part 1 of a 100 Part Series

"Unsupported what?!"

As my brain remained fried from a long day of bridge, I thought back over some of the most sinful bridge mistakes of the day.

Singleton leads rarely work.

Unsupported Aces almost never work.

So why do we keep doing them?

I guess there's something magical about finding the defense that wins 3% of the time and sets up extra tricks for declarer 100% of the time.

There will be plenty of posts about leading unsupported Aces. In fact, every time I witness it happening I'll make a post. Once I hit 100, I will tally up how many times it worked.

Playing precision last night I pick up this hand:

In Standard, an uncontested auction will go: 1C-1D-1S-1NT.. Many arguments can be made for passing 1NT. Some might argue for rebidding 2C. If you play that 1D denies a 4 card major 100% of the time (which I like just bidding my long suits first) then 2C is right. It might even go 1C-1D-1NT-2C.

In precision 1C is all hands with 16+, so many hands we would open 1C in standard are opened 1D. It works well on this hand.

I open 1D ("Could be as few as two!", partner bids 1NT so he has at most 6 cards in the majors and at least 7 cards in the minors. With a weak hand and 5 diamonds he may rebid 1NT, but I feel relatively comfortable about rebidding 2C. Partner has at least 2 and playing in a 7 card fit isn't the worst thing in the world.

My opponents ask for some clarification and I give them as much I can without showing them my hand. My partner says I promise 5 clubs, I add that this does not clarify my diamond holding however with 5 or 6 I would probably rebid diamonds. He would bid a 4 card major if he had one.

I guess the motivation was to cut down my ruffing power and turn it back into a NT hand. This is usually better suited for hands where we don't have an established fit (like 1C pass pass pass) so when the Ace of clubs hit the table I was a little surprised. 

Everyone follows, Lefty continues with a club to Righty's King, who plays the last club for me which I win in dummy with the Jack, lefty pitches a spade.

I count 7 tricks. The 8th will come from the King of diamonds being on sides or a nice break in spades - anything other than Jxxx or 10xxx will work. 

I play a low a diamond to my queen, it loses. I lose two heart tricks, ruff the third and find that spades are 3-3, making 2 for a lovely +90.

As I reflect on how making 1NT would rely on a friendly lead or poor defense, I think about the club position...

Let's pretend West finds a better lead. It's not the best hand to lead from. Westy can make a safe lead of a spade (top of nothing or MUD - middle up down) hoping to hit partner, under lead the king of diamonds which turns out to be wrong, or under lead the Ace of hearts. Sneaky, but at the two level, what are the chances you never get your Ace. I'm sure some people disagree. The diamond "could be 2" but partner has not bid hearts or spades so I think leading a major is right.

On a spade lead I will come to the same tricks. I need a nice break in spades or the king of diamonds to be on sides. I can't really count on both of those things so I need to try to play the clubs for 2 losers (ugh). The hearts are worthless and ruffing a heart doesn't get me anywhere. 

I now have to guess the club suit completely. 

This is huge. 

Because I'm probably gonna guess it wrong.

I can assume the club honors are split and as I start to play out the hand, I will discover that the heart honors are split and the diamond honors are split. Remember the bidding - it was uncontested and I have no long hesitant passes to consider.  

How am I ever going to guess the 10 of clubs?!

If the diamond King is off I need spades to work out. It does me no good to ruff a diamond, lose 2 hearts and ruff a heart because this brings me to 7 tricks. At this point the opponents could draw my last trump and take whatever's left.

I have limited transportation and I don't want to lose a spade ruff. I think my best line of play is to figure out trump, go to the board to guess diamonds, then figure out spades. It doesn't really get me anywhere to monkey around with hearts and hope the opponents slip up and lead a diamond because by that time I could lose a spade ruff.

So let's say I'm in my hand after opening lead. I lead a low club to the board. An honor doesn't fall out of lefty's hand. Lefty could have A10x, x, Ax, Kx or 10x. I don't know the percentages off hand, but I have to make a decision.

Let's say I play the 9.. it loses to the 10. 

Unless righty decides to fly his King and crash the Ace on the same trick, I'm down, losing 3 clubs, 2 hearts and 1 diamond. This also shows why lefty should never fly the Ace immediately. 

Or let's say I lead low from my hand, ducked by lefty, and I put in the jack. It loses to the King. I later get back to the board and lead a low club towards my hand. Righty plays low.

Do I put in the Queen hoping the 10 falls? Do I duck hoping the Ace falls? I'll feel really stupid losing a finesse to the doubleton 10...

Hopefully you can see my point. I have a lot of guess work, especially on a hand like this and when the unsupported Ace hits the table, life becomes a hell of a lot easier.

----

Earlier in the day, in first seat, Red vs Green, I pick up:

This looks like a hand I could lie and bid Flannery on, but my partner and I don't play that silly convention. And despite the fact that one of my mortal enemies is on my right, I refuse to open this 2H for several reasons. Aside from the obvious fact that I only have 5 and I'm in first seat, I really hate opening weak 2s with a/another 4 card major. I don't really like doing it with 3, but sometimes I get yelled at for that. In third seat these rules don't apply.

Pass Pass Pass - 1NT. It's announced as 15-17, but I know damn well it could be 14. I don't mind that at all, I think it's a good lie. The one I hate is when people play 15-18 in fourth seat. Why?! Partner could easily have the right 7 count for game or what he considers a bad 8 count and you'll be stuck playing some crappy 1NT contract when you're cold for 4 hearts. Rant over.

I could again be devious and bid 2D (showing both majors) but everyone can see the colors, and I've already passed. I'm not fooling anyone and plus if my partner can't find a bid in third seat we're in deep doo doo. Down 1 is good bridge. Down 1 doubled vulnerable is usually not good bridge.

I always like to lead a major on these hands. I really hate to plop down the King of hearts. I used to reason with these hands that if I lead my fourth best (under leading an honor) I have another entry so there isn't a huge risk of losing the trick. But KQ scare me. And lately I've been trying to make a lead to hit partner. If I have a doubleton major suits against NT and no natural lead, I like to lead it hoping to catch partner with length in that suit.

So I decide to lead the 6 of spades and dummy produces some riches. These is not really a hand we can set so we should be playing to hold them to as few as possible.

The spade rides to declarers Ace. He plays a low diamond to the queen, partner wins the King.

He switches to a club, declarer plays the jack. I can duck it and probably should, but partner must have a good reason for switching. So I win it and play a club back, smothering partner's Queen. Declarer plays the jack of spades and a club to the board where he runs 2 more spades and 2 more clubs. As declarer pitches 4 hearts I start to think I was smart not to lead into AJ of hearts. He plays a low diamond to his Ace, my 10 falls and he claims the last two tricks with the 98 of diamonds. 

Maybe I pitched the 10 of diamonds. Who knows. It was -210 for a cold zero.

Here are all 4 hands:

There were several ways this could have went better.

-First off I can lead a heart. Pretty much any heart.  I think 4th best is right.

-When I get in with the club I can switch to a heart. Pretty much any heart. Partner probably isn't getting in too many more times. If he hasn't switched to a heart maybe he will never switch to a heart. 

-I can duck the club. It's not going anywhere. As it turns out declarer now has transportation issues. He can give up a spade trick, overtaking his jack to finesse the club but that doesn't get him anywhere if partner ducks the queen. Sure, he can always play me for Ax of clubs, but he still has to overtake a spade to get to the rest of them.

-If I pitched the 10 of diamonds I can save it.

-Partner can still switch to a heart at trick three. Looking at his hand I can understand why he didn't want to lead a heart. It's an unsupported Ace. Bleh! But what are the alternatives?

Spades should seem hopeless at this point. It doesn't hurt (as it turns out) to play another but it doesn't help either. Declarer led a diamond.

"When two people lead the same suit, one of them is wrong."

Declarer's advice was simple - don't attack dummy's long suit. They have at least 7 clubs together but it has some holes. Declarer will need to do some work in clubs, and of course guess correctly. He could* guess wrong and put up the king, promoting the queen, but that still doesn't get us anywhere.

Dummy doesn't have anything in hearts. If declarer has the King or Queen, it's on sides and there's nothing you can do about it. Declarer will probably not play hearts out of his hand towards dummy. He has the spade entry. He may have something like KJ in hearts and could guess the finesse wrong... but then again your clubs seem vulnerable and maybe it's more likely declarer will work on clubs rather than hearts.

It's not an easy switch, but I think it's reasonable. It's the lesser of all evils.

Next time I'll lead a heart and make it easier on partner.

In my mind when I replayed this hand, I led a low heart to partner's Ace, a heart back to my K and Queen, a fourth heart to declarer's jack. Declarer plays a diamond to the Q and partner's K, a club back to my Ace, I cash my 5th heart and hold it to -90. Yay!